Helse Vest RHF unifies risk management with Synergi Life

Building a connected, transparent risk culture with Synergi Life - unifying safety, compliance and cybersecurity.

Helse Vest RHF is the Western Norway Regional Health Authority. It is responsible for providing specialist health services to almost 1.1 million people in an area of over 40,500 square kilometres (15,600 square miles). The authority supports the 14 hospitals and treatment centres in the Norwegian counties of Rogaland and Vestland.

Helse Vest group of hospitals began using Synergi Life in 2007 with the primary objective of streamlining their safety, risk, and compliance management. Since then, Helse Vest has expanded its use of Synergi Life, building a framework for strategic and operational risk management.

Excellence in QHSE with a transparent and integrated system

Transparency is central to Helse Vest’s QHSE culture, enabling all healthcare enterprises to stay informed about shared risks. Before the implementation of Synergi Life, Helse Vest relied on Excel spreadsheets to manage its risk data. Due to the organization’s complexity, with more than 35 locations and over 31,000 employees, stakeholders sometimes missed important information.

Helse Vest aimed to achieve a holistic approach to QHSE by consolidating all QHSE tools into a single, standardized software platform with fully integrated modules. To enhance transparency and eliminate data silos, Helse Vest implemented a shared solution across the organization. This enables seamless data flow across locations and systems, providing a unified view of the risk landscape. With all employees having direct access to Synergi Life, everyone contributes to improving hospital quality and mitigating risks.

Each local health authority within Helse Vest use individual dashboards, allowing stakeholders to easily access the complete risk picture and use it to make educated decisions. Karl Andre Sædal, Product Area Manager for Quality Control at Helse Vest, explains, “Leaders analyse the incidents being reported to the unit and work managing the risks. If they get many incidents of a specific type, they can utilize the risk management module and try to reduce the risk of that incident happening. We want to work with risks, both in the incident module and the risk management module.”

Helse Vest colleagues — Image source: Helse Vest RHF

Standardized risk oversight across the entire organization

Because all the modules are fully compatible, Synergi Life shows the unified view of risk through complex reports and dashboards. This helps the organization easily follow up on a specific risk with the relevant data.

Helse Vest has achieved full standardization in Synergi Life, covering risk assessments, reporting, and data processing. Nejla Karahasan, Advisor at Helse Vest says, “It’s a huge benefit to use the same database and the same program, then hospitals can learn from each other, like Helse Bergen can learn from Helse Stavanger or the other local health authorities.” By standardizing the categorization of risks and incidents, they can analyse them in the same dashboard.

Using one software means there’s a single interface that benefits users. A single login saves managers time and makes it more likely that they will work with risk management.

I really don’t think that you can get this complete package of working within quality, incident, and risk management in any other system. It gives a unique overview of all the risks.

Karl Andre Sædal

Product Area Manager for Quality Control

Managing IT change and cyber risks through centralized insights

The entire organization of Helse Vest relies on around 2,000 systems of varying sizes and complexity. Helse Vest started using the Synergi Life Cyber Security module to improve its aggregated risk picture.

With the complexity of change management for IT systems in the health region, it is crucial to get a complete risk picture of each system, to be able to track actions connected to the change, to monitor the progress, and to spread and coordinate the timing of changes across the organization. Synergi Life can be connected to other existing systems and various types of software solutions, making this possible.

The Synergi Life Cyber Security module helps all Helse Vest’s hospitals and departments to understand the impact of potential cyber security risks in their organization. Karl Andre Sædal says, “Transparency of risks for each level makes it clear what can happen, and what should be avoided in the future. For example, if a manager within a hospital needs additional information from risks connected to changes in an IT system, they can log in to one system (Synergi Life) to see the complete risk picture for that unit, and plan for implementing the change. It’s gold.”

Helse Vest workers — Image source: Helse Vest RHF

Planning for proactive risk alignment with bowtie visualization

Helse Vest wants the organization to better understand the interactions between risk incidents and controls. Because they need a system that can connect the entire organization and implement changes, they are implementing Synergi Life Barrier Management module with bowtie diagrams. The bowtie visualization helps them enhance stakeholder communication and prioritize improvements. Karl Andre Sædal explains, “Since each module in Synergi Life is compatible, we can benefit from the entire toolbox of modules and case types, knowing that everything is in one place and easy to find.”

Helse Vest expects the barrier management module to strengthen connections across departments and organizational levels, enabling the sharing of effective strategies both locally and regionally. As they accumulate data over time, the barrier management and risk management module will show the whole risk picture; for example, they can go back to the incident module and see if the actions implemented there have a positive impact.

Once fully implemented, the solution will support more proactive and aligned risk management across all hospitals.

Image source: Helse Vest RHF

Profile

Customer name: Helse Vest 

Web address: https://www.helse-vest.no/en/

Market: Healthcare

Employees: Over 31,000

Solution/product: Synergi Life – Risk Management, Audit Management, Cyber Security, Barrier Management, Incident Management, Action Plan Module

Customer feedback

Why Helse Vest chose Synergi Life:

Centralized data management and integrated workflows.
Supportive and engaged Synergi Life team that prioritizes customized tool configuration.
Quality QHSE and risk management software that supports their growth and development.

What Helse Vest gained with Synergi Life:

Enhanced decision-making with actionable insights based on vast amounts of data.
Streamlined processes integrating QHSE processes and workflows into a single platform.
Getting the “big picture” by bringing all ongoing initiatives into a single framework.
Increased transparency and stakeholder engagement.