Increasing emergency training compliance by 25% in just 2 months with Cairns and Hinterland Hospital and Health Service (CHHHS)

Overview

Cairns and Hinterland Hospital and Health Service (CHHHS) is committed to delivering quality healthcare services to approximately 280,000 residents across one of Queensland's largest and most geographically diverse regions.

Covering approximately 142,000 square kilometres, the health service operates more than 50 facilities, including hospitals, healthcare centres and administrative sites. Supporting up to 9,500 workers, contractors and volunteers, CHHHS manages emergency preparedness and compliance across a complex network of locations stretching from the Daintree in the north to Croydon in the west and Tully / Mission Beach in the south.

For the CHHHS Health, Safety and Wellbeing team, keeping emergency information accurate and ensuring thousands of workers completed training each year was becoming increasingly difficult using manual processes. As the organisation continued to grow and evolve, they needed a more practical and scalable way to manage emergency preparedness across the region.

The challenge

Before implementing PlanStudio® and PlanSafe®, CHHHS relied heavily on manual processes to manage both evacuation diagrams and emergency training. While this approach worked, it created a number of constraints at scale:

• Accurate floor plans were difficult to obtain across older, repeatedly renovated facilities
• Close to 1,000 evacuation diagrams were maintained in Microsoft Visio, making updates slow
• Training records were completed on paper and manually entered into the learning management system
• Up to 9,500 training records required data entry every year

Obtaining accurate floor plans and evacuation diagrams was challenging, particularly across older facilities that had undergone multiple renovations over several decades. At the same time, evacuation diagrams were managed using Microsoft Visio, making updates across hundreds of diagrams time-consuming and difficult to maintain.

"Updating plans was really hard. We were using Microsoft Visio, which is fine for small-scale stuff, but when you try to bring it into an organisation this big, where we've got close to 1,000 fire diagrams, it's massively challenging to keep it all correct".

Dave, WHS Team Leader, Health, Safety and Wellbeing, Cairns and Hinterland Hospital and Health Service

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Training delivery created additional challenges. New staff received in-person walk-arounds, paper records were completed and submitted, and training data then had to be manually entered into the organisation's learning management system.

"It was all pretty much manual before. Line managers would give new staff a walk-around, they'd fill out a piece of paper, email it through to us, and a member of my team would sit down and manually input that into the learning management system. With over 9,500 employees, all required to do that every 12 months, we were effectively doing data entry on up to 9,500 people a year".

Dave

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With thousands of workers requiring annual training and facilities spread across a vast geographical area, the approach was becoming increasingly difficult to manage and scale. The team knew there had to be a better way to keep information current, reduce administration and make training easier for staff to complete.

"Trying to get an accurate plan was a real challenge. A building might have been built in the 1960s and renovated multiple times since then".

Dave

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The solution

In 2026, CHHHS implemented PlanStudio® and PlanSafe® to create a more efficient, scalable and standardised approach to emergency management.

PlanStudio® enabled the team to manage and update floor plans and evacuation diagrams digitally to ensure compliance is covered, while PlanSafe® replaced manual training processes with site-specific online emergency training accessible across the organisation's diverse workforce.

"They are spatially accurate – they line up with relevant satellite imagery and everything. That's saved us a lot of time getting accurate information out to our workforce for fire safety compliance and training".

Dave

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Together, the software solutions reduced reliance on paper-based processes, improved access to accurate building information and provided workers with greater flexibility to complete training when and where it suited them.

"It gives you a lot of flexibility and it's a huge time saver".

Dave

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Dave and the team have also adopted PlanStudio® in-house, without the steep learning curve that comes with competing tools like CAD or Revit.

"I find it pretty easy to use, and honestly, as the nerd in me – it's actually quite a lot of fun. I find it quite cathartic to sit down and update evacuation diagrams".

Dave

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Throughout the rollout, CHHHS worked closely with the Locatrix team to adapt the platforms to the realities of a large and geographically dispersed healthcare environment. The result was a solution that not only improved compliance and efficiency, but was practical for the people responsible for managing safety every day.

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Outcomes

What began as an effort to modernise emergency management processes quickly delivered broader benefits across compliance, administration and workforce engagement:

1. 25% increase in emergency training compliance in two months

Following implementation, CHHHS rapidly increased emergency training compliance across the organisation. Within approximately two months, over 5,000 workers completed their emergency management training through PlanSafe® at scale, digitally.

"That's not doing any real kind of serious campaign. All we've done is mark people as non-compliant on their mandatory training dashboard. That's now removed, particularly from my team, the requirement to sit down and manually do data entry. And it's removed the requirement for line managers to physically arrange walk-arounds and take people off the floor".

Dave

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"Our executive team is really quite impressed to have seen compliance increase by 25% in the space of about two months".

Dave

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2. 500 hours of manual administration removed each year

By digitising emergency training and automating record keeping, CHHHS eliminated substantial administrative effort associated with paper forms, manual data entry and training coordination across nearly 9,500 workers. Dave estimated around two hours per day of manual administration for his team, every working day of the year – a saving of approximately 500 hours annually.

"We were spending a couple of hours a day doing administration associated with the record keeping. Now that's gone".

Dave

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3. Standardised emergency training across more than 50 facilities

PlanSafe® has enabled CHHHS to deliver consistent emergency training across hospitals, healthcare centres and administrative sites, regardless of location or shift patterns.

"It's a really simple way to make sure that your training is being delivered consistently across the board. Especially in a large organisation where there's a geographical spread, you're not getting local variations in the training".

Dave

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4. Reduced costs across training, travel and administration

CHHHS has seen a reduction in costs when comparing PlanSafe® to their prior training approach, with savings extending beyond staff time to fleet and travel expenses.

"It frees my team up to focus on other high-value activities instead of spending considerable time on logistics planning, data entry, travel and other administrative tasks associated with face to face training. When you break it down by hourly rate, the time saved on travel and administration alone would be worth tens of thousands of dollars. On top of that, there are the added savings in fleet vehicle costs, such as fuel and wear and tear. The overall savings are significant".

Dave

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5. Faster updates across almost 1,000 evacuation diagrams

With approximately 960 evacuation diagrams already in the system and more being added, CHHHS can now respond quickly to renovations, expansions and building changes without relying on time-intensive manual updates.

"The flexibility to get in there, make changes straight away – that would be my biggest reason to recommend it. It looks really good, and it just saves a huge amount of time".

Dave

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6. More time spent on safety, less time spent on paperwork

Reducing administrative burden has allowed the safety team to spend less time on paperwork and training logistics and more time supporting broader safety and compliance initiatives across the health service.

"It saves a huge amount of time and effort and just streamlines everything".

Dave

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7. Greater flexibility for staff across a 24/7 workforce

PlanSafe® gives staff greater flexibility to complete training when it suits them, regardless of location, device or shift pattern.

"It's highly customisable, easy to roll out, easy for people to use. They can use it on any device – a mobile phone if they want. And it gives people a lot of flexibility to do it whenever suits them. In an organisation like ours that runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week, you can literally do your training at 2am on a Saturday morning if you're on shift and have some time to do your mandatory fire safety training".

Dave

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Looking ahead

Today, CHHHS continues to use PlanStudio® and PlanSafe® to support emergency preparedness across its extensive healthcare network. As well as managing compliance and administration, the platforms have made it easier for the Health, Safety and Wellbeing team to keep information current, deliver consistent training and support staff across a geographically dispersed workforce.

"I think it's been really positive for all of us – my team, and also the organisation generally".

Dave

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