Case Study: Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust achieves 53.5% reduction in documentation time with Cerner CareAware VitalsLink and iBus

Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust reduces documentation time by 53.5 percent

Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, a London-based trust of five hospitals with about 10,500 staff and 1.2 million patient contacts a year, faced rising demand and pressure on clinical teams. Leadership wanted to cut the time clinicians spent documenting vital signs and provide near–real-time National Early Warning Scores (NEWS) to improve responsiveness and free up nursing time.

By deploying Cerner CareAware VitalsLink and CareAware iBus for bedside device integration, Imperial automated capture and calculation of observations and NEWS, cutting documentation time per full NEWS set by 53.5% (from 2:35 to 1:12) and releasing an estimated 5,800+ nursing hours over 15 months. The automation reduced transcription errors, triggered alerts for abnormal values, and improved handovers and overall patient responsiveness.

Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust

Gerry Bolger

Clinical and Nursing Informatics Advisor/consultant