Farewell Chatham-Kent Health Alliance

This will be my final blog as Vice President and Chief Nursing Executive at the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance (CKHA). Parting is a time for reflection, and as I reflect back on my 5-1/2 years at CKHA I am amazed at what has been accomplished.

I firmly believe that the people are the strength of any organization, and that is certainly true at CKHA. From the housekeepers who work so hard to keep our environment clean and safe, the porters who make sure our patients get to where they need to go safely, and the nurses who show their caring and compassion every day. I want to thank each of you and want you to know that your hard work and dedication have been appreciated. I also would like to thank my readers for “tuning in” to my weekly blogs.

Finally, thank you to my team! I would not have been able to accomplish what I have without each of you. YOU are responsible for the successes achieved by CKHA, and I know you will continue to strive for excellence.

As I embark on my new journey as President and Chief Executive Officer of Tillsonburg District Memorial Hospital in Tillsonburg and Alexandra Hospital in Ingersoll I will carry with me many great memories of my time at CKHA, and as bittersweet as it is to say, farewell! 

Language of Caring

I’ve now attended the third in the series of nine skill building workshops designed to “hard wire” skills that make our caring felt. During this session we talked about Acknowledging Feelings.

Every day we work with people who are filled with feelings; patients who are tired and anxious, family members who are worried or overwhelmed, coworkers who are swamped or grateful. When we tune in to people’s feelings we ease their anxiety and make our caring felt.   

We learned to respectfully check out whether or not we’ve read the person right. Make sure you ask questions such as, you sound… or you seem… Once you understand how the person is feeling you know how to help and the person feels understood.

We also learned what not to do, we should never:

1.  Tell someone you know how they feel;
2.  Dismiss the person’s feelings, or
3.  When you reflect back, don’t sound annoyed or angry.

When the people we serve are full of feelings, it is healing for them to be understood.  We also demonstrate that we are, caring people, caring for people. 

Summer Safety

Summer is here, the warm weather has arrived and we can now be outside, enjoying the fresh air and sunshine!

As Canadians, we wait all winter for the heat and sun, but we do need to be careful to prevent over exposure to both. Heat and sun can both cause pain and suffering if we get too much.  

Please keep the following tips in mind when enjoying the outdoors this summer:

1. 1)    If you are out in the sun, be sure to wear sun appropriate clothing and make sure to use lots of sunscreen on exposed skin.
2. 2)    Be aware that sitting under a tree or umbrella doesn’t decrease your exposure to the sunrays that cause damage to skin. 
3. 3)    If you are fortunate enough to take part in any water activities throughout the summer, take care to reapply sunscreen frequently and take an extra shirt to wear if you are going to be in the sun for an extended period of time.
4. 4)    If you must be outside in extreme heat, make sure to drink lots of water and/or fruit juices and take breaks in a cooler environment, if possible.

It is expected to be a hot summer with higher than average temperatures.  It is important to take the appropriate precautions when planning outdoor activities during the hot weather to make sure you are protected while having fun in the sun.

Enjoy the summertime, with family and friends but please be safe. 

Housekeeper for a Day

Recently, Erika Vitale, Infection Prevention & Control Quality Analyst, had the opportunity to become a “housekeeper for a day”. Not everyone gets the opportunity to walk in someone else’s shoes, and I’d like to share some of her experience with you.

Erika was paired up with a housekeeper on Medicine A; in the course of her work she noted that there appeared to be good collaboration between housekeeping and nursing in terms of making safer patient care a priority. Physicians were also very accommodating in allowing the housekeeper to finish up their tasks.

At Chatham Kent Health Alliance (CKHA), housekeeping audits are done regularly to ensure that high touch areas are not missed, when a patient commented “boy, I wouldn’t want to be watched at work like that – you work so hard you don’t deserve that.” The housekeeper kindly explained that ”it’s really important to monitor this to make sure we are all doing the best job we can and that we are all aware of areas that might get missed – it helps us to remember them in the future. Once you miss it once, you likely won’t miss it again.” Erika found out what that was like when an audit showed she missed a light switch when she thought she was being very thorough! (See picture below.)

At left, a special light used during auditing reveals an area that was missed during cleaning.  

Audits such as this are done at CKHA on a regular basis. 

At the end of the day, Erika had the following comments. “When I hear the term housekeeper, I think of someone who washes floors, and dusts furniture. What we have in this hospital are people who are much more experienced and knowledgeable about maintaining a safe environment than what this name implies. They are hard working and passionate about their jobs and the role they play in patient safety. I suggest the term “clinical environmental specialist”

I’d like to say thank our housekeeping staff for welcoming Erika to their work and also for everything they do each day to keep our patients safe. Thanks also to Erika for taking the time to “walk a mile in their shoes”, and for sharing her experience.

Chatham-Kent Health Alliance’s Medicine Unit gets an Upgrade!

Everyone likes to see their home or workspace become more efficient through a much needed renovation. The same holds true at CKHA as improvements are underway on the Medicine Unit.

The bathroom doors in patient rooms are being widened to make it easier for patients to receive assistance, when necessary, in getting in the washroom.

In addition, staff frequently transport patients to or from the Emergency Department, Diagnostic Imaging or the Intensive Care Unit. Often these patients are on a stretcher. Prior to the renovation, staff went through a double door linking the older section of the hospital to the newer section. This required manually opening the double doors (each door opens in an opposite direction) and then push the stretcher through, which was very onerous for staff. With the renovation, they simply swipe their identification badge; push a button and the doors open. 

So simple and such a big improvement!

 Knowing not every challenge can be resolved, another positive outcome of this experience was that a Manager and staff were able to communicate to the Senior Team about a possible improvement and it was recognized and honoured. And, in return, the Manager and staff of the unit took the time to write a note of appreciation to senior administration for listening to them and getting this done. Another way we show we are Caring People, Caring for People.

Registered Nurses Colleen Cadotte (L) and Kim Russell (R) say Thank You for the renovations to the Medicine Unit. 

Language of Caring

Recently I attended the first in a series of nine skill building workshops designed to “hard wire” skills that make our caring felt. During this session we learned how speaking from the heart can help people become less anxious. I think that’s important, coming to the hospital certainly increases anxiety even in the calmest of people. Being able to make our patients, their families and our coworkers feel less anxious while in a stressful situation is healthier for everybody!

When we speak from the head, people get valuable information, but they don’t feel our caring. Speaking from the heart will allow us to meet our patients’ health care needs and make our caring felt. People don’t care how much we know, until they know how much we care. Powerful words and a powerful lesson learned.

The next session is called ”The Practice of Presence”, I’m looking forward to that one and will tell you about it after I’ve had the chance to participate.

 Thanks for reading!

Quality Improvement Plan

The Excellent Care for All Act (ECFAA) requires that hospital organizations develop an annual Quality Improvement Plan (QIP) for the following fiscal year and make that plan available to the public. The QIPs are an opportunity to highlight an organization's commitment to delivering high quality health care; creating a positive patient experience; ensuring that it is responsive and accountable to the public; holding its executive team accountable for its achievement; and being transparent. The Professional Practice Team, in collaboration with the Infection Prevention and Control (IPAC) team, and Quippy, our mascot, provided two-hour education sessions throughout the months of February and March to every Registered Nurse and Registered Practical Nurse at Chatham-Kent Health Alliance (CKHA). The QIP Education focused on Pressure Ulcers (bedsores), Falls, Early Warning Scoring System (a system used to identify subtle changes in a patient’s condition) and Clostridium-difficile (C-diff), the most common cause of infectious diarrhea in hospital. CKHA is fortunate to have committed, dedicated and caring staff that are always looking for ways to improve care for their patients. As an “Exceptional Community Hospital, Setting Standards - Exceeding Expectations” we recognize there is always room for improvement. The recent QIP education allowed nurses to share knowledge, develop awareness, engage and empower staff, and, as a result, to raise the bar of service excellence. At times, the sessions were lively, interactive and motivating for the participants and the facilitators. Each and every staff member has contributed to the success of CKHA’s Quality Improvement Plan for 2011/2012. Inpatient Satisfaction has increased to 70%, Pressure Ulcers on Continuing Care have decreased by 3%, Central Line infection rate continues to be zero (for a total of 42 months) and there has been two quarters where the C-diff Infection rate at Sydenham was zero. Congratulations to everyone… YOU have made a difference!