Communication, collaboration, commitment are cornerstones of high reliability healthcare
Providing dependably excellent care for all patients all of the time is the essence of high reliability healthcare, as defined by the Joint Commission in its 2013 report. Two large health systems—Kaiser Permanente and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital—are on the path to becoming highly reliable organizations. In recent years, improved processes…
EASE app updates families on patients' progress during surgery
As the anesthesiologist places the mask on the little girl’s face, the circulating nurse snaps a photograph and sends it to her parents’ cell phone with a caption saying, “she is safely off to sleep.” The nurse continues to send photographs and videos of the girl’s heart procedure along with…
Wise use of social media can enhance your professional career
Privacy violations, work distractions, wasting time—with all these risks, who needs social media? You do. Social media is key for OR leaders to successfully manage their professional lives. Savvy leaders accept that social media is a two-sided coin. “The reality is that every post, Tweet, and text is filled with…
The three R's of staff engagement: Relationships, rounding, and recognition
Staff in the OR must be fully engaged each day to ensure they are providing excellent patient care. But finding time to develop that engagement is particularly challenging for OR leaders. “The OR environment is intense and dynamic, changing minute by minute,” says Amy Bethel, MPA, RN, NE-BC, from UnityPoint…
No time to waste: A children's hospital Lean team streamlines its turnover process
Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles (CHLA) is renowned for patient care, but by early 2013 the increased complexity of new technology and other factors had eroded efficiency. Orthopedics had fallen to the bottom quartile compared to national benchmarks for turnover times, and executive leadership called for change. Within orthopedic surgery,…
Getting all OR staff to buy into debriefing process boosts efficacy
The main distinction between good and bad debriefings comes down to the level of staff engagement. That’s what the surgical team at the University of Colorado Hospital, Aurora, learned during a project designed to improve the quality of the 30- to 60-second conversations held after surgery. “In a good debriefing,…
Be constructive, not combative, with union staff
Union membership has declined steeply in recent decades. Increasingly, organized labor is targeting the healthcare industry as a growth opportunity. This is creating a leadership challenge for OR directors and managers. In 2012, approximately 21% of hospitals in the US had a union nursing staff. That percentage could soon increase…
You can't say that: Using social media in the healthcare setting requires sound judgment
It is hard to have tea with a friend or brag about a school soccer victory without involving social media. What was once a private or family matter no longer seems real until it is texted, posted, or even turned into a movie. Healthcare organizations, including ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs),…
Vanderbilt adds new twist to M&M tradition with focus on improvement
The morbidity and mortality (M&M) conference is a traditional forum that provides clinicians with an opportunity to discuss errors and adverse events. Most are discipline specific. When a mortality or significant morbidity occurs in the OR, however, it is rarely owned by a single discipline. Multiple disciplines take care of…
Executive walk rounds open gates to communication with staff
“Each year, diagnostic errors result in the deaths of an estimated 44,000 to 80,000 patients, and many thousands die because of teamwork and communication errors affecting their care or because they do not receive necessary evidence-based interventions,” according to an article published online last year in JAMA. No one would…
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