← pling.care30 hours on the ward.
We shadowed nurses for 30 hours to document exactly where their time goes. Every minute. Every footstep. Every interruption.
Only half the shift is spent with patients.
The modern nurse is highly trained, yet forced to spend nearly half their day acting as a courier, an investigator, and a coordinator.
Where the other 49% goes.
A breakdown of the time spent away from the bedside. Notice what we highlighted.
About this study — methodology and data collection+
Observation protocol
Four observers shadowed nurses at a surgical ward at a hospital in Eastern Norway. Using a stopwatch and standardized forms, they documented the nurse’s activity every 15 seconds — capturing what was happening at that exact moment. Each session lasted 30–60 minutes, producing 6,929 total data points across 30+ hours.
Every activity was pre-classified into one of three categories: directly value-creating (patient care, medication, charting), necessary non-value-creating (phone calls, walking, cleaning), or non-value-creating (searching for numbers, printer problems). Each task was further tagged as to whether it could be eliminated by a digital communication platform.
The ward and context
The surgical ward serves mostly previously healthy patients admitted for elective abdominal surgery. It has an open patient kitchen where mobile patients can get food and drink themselves. Contextual variables were recorded per session: patients assigned, mobility levels, kitchen staff presence, and low-activity days.
Privacy
All informants anonymous per SSB normative standard (40+ possible informants on ward). No dates recorded — only season and year. Raw data contains no personal information, stored on encrypted devices.
Isolating the pattern.
When we isolate the time lost purely to outdated communication and lack of real-time information, a distinct pattern emerges.
Every highlighted task shares the same root cause: nurses lack real-time information about what patients need, where to go, and who is responsible.
minutes. Every single shift.
That is the exact amount of time lost to walking, searching, and asking questions that a smart communication system answers instantly.
What if the patient could tell you what they need — before you walk to their room?
That’s the core of Pling. Patients send detailed requests from their bedside. The right person gets the right information instantly. No walking. No guessing. No interrupting.
Today
7 steps. Two blind trips. For one patient.
With Pling
3 steps. One trip. Prepared from the start.
And this is just the beginning.
When patients can describe exactly what they need, the request doesn’t have to go to the nurse at all. It goes to the right person.
“Coffee with milk and sugar”
Routed directly to kitchen staff. Nurse never interrupted.
“Pain level 6/10”
Nurse sees the report, reviews the chart, and arrives ready to assess and act.
“I need a clean shirt”
Routed to the ward assistant responsible for supplies that day.
“Can I speak to my doctor?”
Request logged and forwarded. No phone tag, no forgotten messages.
A request for a toothbrush goes to the ward assistant. A food order goes to the kitchen. A clinical concern goes to the nurse. Everyone does what they’re trained for.
Pling is an information and logistics tool — it does not replace clinical judgement. No medication is administered, and no clinical decision is made, without the nurse’s own assessment first. Pling simply ensures they arrive informed, prepared, and without wasted trips.
Giving time back to the bedside.
By routing requests instantly, providing context before entering a room, and eliminating blind coordination — Pling gives nurses back what matters most.
+16% more directly value-adding time
A crisis that extends far beyond one ward.
What we observed in a single surgical ward reflects a continent-wide emergency. Europe’s healthcare workforce is collapsing under the weight of burnout, aging, and systemic inefficiency.
healthcare workers the EU is projected to be short by 2030 — including 2.3 million nurses, the single largest gap.
of healthcare workers report experiencing burnout — driving attrition, absenteeism, and early retirement.
annual cost of sickness absence in Germany alone — 4.5% of GDP — driven by staff burnout.
"“Nurses so stressed that three were hospitalized with heart rhythm disorders”"
Give them back their shift.
Pling is a patient-nurse communication platform that lets patients send detailed requests from their bedside — and routes each request to the right person instantly.
No more walking to rooms blind. No more phone tag. No more nurses making coffee when kitchen staff are available. 37 minutes back, every shift — backed by data, not assumptions.
Why now
From March 2025, the EU’s European Health Data Space regulation requires all hospitals to transition to interoperable digital systems. As hospitals invest in compliance, they simultaneously face the worst workforce crisis in a generation. The European Commission has explicitly called for labour-saving digital solutions as a strategic response.
Pling sits at the intersection: compliance-driven digital infrastructure that also directly addresses the urgent need to free clinical time and retain exhausted staff.