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.