Detailed Whiteboard View
What we would like to know is how to prioritize the 30 treatments due that hour. For example, our hospital policy is that patient attitude is recorded every hour. But a blood draw trumps that, and evacuating a chest tube trumps THAT, etc. So without showing all the minute details, the solution that we came up with is this:
a. Assign colors to the different sections (Monitoring, Procedures, Fluids, Activity, Laboratory*, etc
b. In the current hour ** show smaller icons corresponding to the sections to indicate this patient has Procedures, Monitoring, and Laboratory due, vs the other patient who has only fluids due. The type of Icon could be a square, a circle (similar to the color code in the desktop whiteboard), a colored letter, or an actual picture. It could either replace the number that currently appears in the space, or could overlay it.
c. As those treatments are completed, not only does the number decrease, but the icons either disappear or fade, letting us know that we're down to, say, Activity for patients at this point.
** d. As far as our clinic goes, we would actually find such a system very helpful for the coming 2 hours, not just the current hour.