• Jennifer A Przybylo, Ange Wang, Pooja Loftus, Kambria H Evans, Isabella Chu, and Lisa Shieh.
• Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California.
• J Hosp Med. 2014 Sep 1; 9 (9): 573-8.

BackgroundThough current hospital paging systems are neither efficient (callbacks disrupt workflow), nor secure (pagers are not Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act [HIPAA]-compliant), they are routinely used to communicate patient information. Smartphone-based text messaging is a potentially more convenient and efficient mobile alternative; however, commercial cellular networks are also not secure.ObjectiveTo determine if augmenting one-way pagers with Medigram, a secure, HIPAA-compliant group messaging (HCGM) application for smartphones, could improve hospital team communication.DesignEight-week prospective, cluster-randomized, controlled trialSettingStanford HospitalInterventionThree inpatient medicine teams used the HCGM application in addition to paging, while two inpatient medicine teams used paging only for intra-team communication.MeasurementsBaseline and post-study surveys were collected from 22 control and 41 HCGM team members.ResultsWhen compared with paging, HCGM was rated significantly (P < 0.05) more effective in: (1) allowing users to communicate thoughts clearly (P = 0.010) and efficiently (P = 0.009) and (2) integrating into workflow during rounds (P = 0.018) and patient discharge (P = 0.012). Overall satisfaction with HCGM was significantly higher (P = 0.003). 85% of HCGM team respondents said they would recommend using an HCGM system on the wards.ConclusionsSmartphone-based, HIPAA-compliant group messaging applications improve provider perception of in-hospital communication, while providing the information security that paging and commercial cellular networks do not.© 2014 The Authors Journal of Hospital Medicine published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of Society of Hospital Medicine.

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