US-based Life Alliance Organ Recovery Organisation (LAORA) is working with Ideagen to enhance document control, improve compliance and introduce smoother auditing processes.
Based at the University of Miami, LAORA will implement Ideagen Q-Pulse, Ideagen’s flagship quality management software, to modernise policy and procedure management and overall document control. LAORA will also benefit from the electronic management of staff training records and a formalised audit system.
Sue McClung, Director of Quality at LAORA, said: “Q-Pulse has been around the organ procurement world for quite a few years and is arguably the most popular software of choice in that field, particularly for document control which is the main reason we required a software system.
“For us, we had no version control of our documentation making it difficult to ensure our staff were following current processes which had to be remedied.
“Q-Pulse was chosen with the objective of making sure all of our policies and procedures are modernised, put into a proper format and stored in a system that everyone can access. This would also ensure that they were working with the most up to date and accurate information.”
Disaster recovery was also an extremely important issue for LAORA, which due to its geographical location on the south coast of America means it faces natural disaster dangers such as hurricanes. However, through Q-Pulse, the system will ensure each member of staff us up to speed on how to keep the business operating during an operational crisis.
Sue added: “We have a business continuity plan in place which is a regulatory requirement for us as it proves that we can continue to operate should a disaster occur.
“This document is sent to everyone in the business detailing how we can continue if shut down by a hurricane, for example. Everyone in the business has to acknowledge and read this document and, as it is stored and accessed via Q-Pulse, it forces everyone in the business to ensure they are aware of it and the related processes around keeping the business functional.” Sue added: “This is electronically linked against everyone’s training record, with Q-Pulse not only recording that a person has acknowledged it but escalating it to management if they have not.”
The management of staff training records, such as against the disaster recovery document, is a major objective for improvement for the organisation. Sue added: “We have a lot of regulatory requirements that we have to meet and need to keep on top of our training records and staff competency levels. Q-Pulse will make it easier in tracking that, automatically flagging areas of improvement or re-training.”
“Q-Pulse will electronically take over those management, maintenance and compliance tasks that can easily be forgotten due to innocent human error,” said Sue. “The software is extremely powerful and I believe it is going to be an excellent addition for us.”
