The Clinical Assignments for Healthcare Students (CAHS) system was developed in Maryland as a result of collaboration between hospitals and schools working together to improve access to clinical sites for students of nursing and allied health. CAHS is designed to:

• Streamline the process of requesting and confirming clinical assignments;
• Help schools identify new clinical sites as they increase enrollments in nursing and allied health; and,
• Provide information on the overall capacity of the state to accommodate students for clinical practice and plan for increased enrollments.

CAHS is designed primarily for schools of nursing and allied health (radiography, imaging, Respiratory care, PT, OT, Pharmacy and Pharmacy Technician, Surgical Technician, etc.) and healthcare facilities (hospitals, long-term care facilities, home care providers, outpatient facilities, etc.) that routinely host students for clinical assignments. The term entity is used to refer to either a facility or a school.

CAHS is a database of patient care facilities that can be searched by schools to find and request clinical assignments for students. Facilities consist of units available for student clinical educational experiences. Examples of a unit would be “Med Surg” and “Maternal Child Health.” Facilities enter information about units open to students and provide details about the types of experiences available on each unit. Facilities create at least one timeslot for each unit. A timeslot contains the specific hours that the unit is open to students over the course of a year and the number of students that can be on the unit during each hour. In this way, the facility communicates exactly what hours a unit is open to students and how many students can be accommodated.

Schools enter data that reflects the types of courses being taught. When searching for a clinical assignment, the course data is automatically attached so that a facility will have some insight into the students coming. Once course data is in the system, schools can initiate searches for hours available within the timeslots that have been constructed by facilities and seek the best fit for the clinical assignment desired. The outcome of the process is a clinical assignment for one instructor within a timeslot of a unit within a particular facility.

The wealth of data entered provides both schools and facilities with an understanding of the other party’s needs and resources. CAHS also facilitates reservations for special groups such as firefighters and police that rely on facilities for clinical experiences outside established nursing and allied health programs.

Specifications for the system were defined by school and hospital users at a series of meetings held in 2004 and 2005. A committee was then formed to help guide program development and test the system as it evolved. Program development was sponsored by the Maryland Hospital Association (MHA). The Association also maintains the system and acts as the overall system administrator. Contact Jeanne DeCosmo (jdecosmo@mhaonline.org) for additional information and access to use the system.