Local nurses leading efforts to improve quality
PRESQUE ISLE — The Aroostook Medical Center is midway through an initiative called Aligning Forces for Quality Transforming Care at the Bedside (AF4Q TCAB) and is already seeing encouraging results.
This nurse-led hospital initiative has worked to engage frontline staff to work together to identify, pilot, test and adopt or abandon new practices that affect workflow and patient care. The initiative also aims to increase the strength and retention of nurses and frontline staff, engage and improve the patient’s experience of care, and improve the effectiveness of the entire care team. Participating staff will then share their successes and lessons learned with other hospitals across the country.
“At TAMC, it is important that we empower our staff with the ability to affect change,” said Lynn Turnbull, TAMC director of patient care services. “TAMC’s participation in this initiative has resulted in positive changes in our nursing units.”
“We have already implemented several changes that the staff has generated,” said Vilma Craig, manager of critical care services and the medical/surgical/telemetry unit. “Our first brainstorming session, which we call a ‘snorkel.’ resulted in the staff identifying several much needed improvements.”
Some of the improvements include adjusting CNA wages to be more competitive with like positions and an area on the medical/surgical/telemetry unit was renovated as a family room for families, friends and neighbors to use.
TAMC also purchased several wireless computer stations on wheels so that nurses can take them to each patient’s bedside as they update medical information. This helps to reduce errors and allows the nurse more time to talk to each patient and attend to their needs.
The goal of the TCAB program is to ensure that staff is able to make changes that allow them to have the tools they need at their fingertips to provide excellent patient care to every patient. The changes currently made are decreasing work disruption and increasing workflow. As more changes are made, staff is finding they have more and more time to spend with their patients.
The AF4Q TCAB program in Maine is being convened by Maine Quality Counts. It is funded by the Robert Wood-Johnson Foundation, AF4Q and all of the regional TCAB efforts are coordinated by the Center for Health Care Quality at the George Washington University Medical Center School of Public Health and Health Services, which serves as the national program office for the initiative.
Local hospitals were asked to apply to participate in this hospital-based quality improvement component of the initiative and are now halfway through the completion of the initiative.
