Case Studies

NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital - Allen Pavilion
New York, New York

Situation
The Allen Pavilion is one of five centers that make up NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital. It combines the convenience and individual attention of a community hospital with the expertise of a world-renowned medical center and one of the top-ranked medical schools, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons.

The Allen Pavilion realized that their existing computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) software was not meeting their needs and were looking for software that would provide improved reporting capability and flexibility. They chose Gannett Fleming, Inc.’s Saber™ system to meet these requirements.

Challenges
The Allen Pavilion is scheduled to undergo a Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) audit in October 2005. Since this will be in just seven months after the conversion to a new CMMS, it is crucial that the data be migrated seamlessly over to the Saber system to maintain full equipment and facility history.

Solution
Gannett Fleming’s approach made sure that the transition between differing CMMS packages was flawless allowing continuous data entry into the system. It was also imperative that there were no gaps in the work order history. To accomplish this, the programmers at Gannett Fleming were able to completely transfer the existing data from the previous CMMS system, including work order history, employee hour history, equipment history, as well as the equipment inventory, and preventive maintenance procedure library.

The Saber system was installed and up and running in under an hour. Training was given to key personnel at the Allen Pavilion to familiarize them with the system and make sure they were completely comfortable performing their normal daily tasks in the new CMMS program, Saber. Personnel were creating and entering work orders within two hours of installation and conversion, and the history was maintained and no data was lost at any point during the migration.

Saber was implemented successfully and swiftly. The Allen Pavilion had virtually no downtime during the transition and were able to maintain their tracking of approximately 820 work orders and 1,287 work order hours per month without incident. The Allen Pavilion now has powerful reporting capability that they can use to help them with their JCAHO inspection in October 2005.

Saber currently tracks 100 percent of existing maintenance staff available working hours and compliance is monitored monthly to ensure maintenance personnel continuously document their time. This data is used by the management staff to not only justify the existing staffing profile but to also justify hiring of additional staff.