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June 15, 2015
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Volume 4, Issue 24
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SERVICE EXCELLENCE
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Service Standard of the Week
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Communication Etiquette:
We follow communication standards and expectations when engaging in electronic and telephone communications; ensuring to always use a warm and friendly tone. We understand that the Connecter is the primary method of communicating organizational information and that it is required reading for all staff.
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Communication Etiquette Tips
By Annemarie Martin, Director of Patient Services and Service Excellence Champion
Improving communication and responsiveness across our organization is a high priority. Employees have identified it as a key satisfaction issue. Communication etiquette involves courteous and well thought out interactions between individuals or groups while using a warm and friendly tone. This is a good time to review some key components of our organization's communication guidelines around telephone, email, and communication etiquette in general.
Three tips around phone, email, and face to face communication include:
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PHONE
BE AWARE OF YOUR SPEAKING VOLUME
Some people just don't know how loud they are, especially when their attention is focused on the person on the other line.
DON'T ANSWER YOUR PHONE WHEN MEETING WITH OTHERS
If you answer a call, you're basically telling the person you're meeting with that someone else is more deserving of your time than they are.
DON'T PLACE YOUR PHONE ON THE TABLE WHEN MEETING WITH OTHERS.
Otherwise, it looks like you're ready to drop them and connect with someone else.
LET THE OTHER PERSON KNOW WHEN YOU HAVE THEM ON SPEAKERPHONE.
If you must put someone on speakerphone, make sure you immediately let them know who else is in the room with you.
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EMAIL
USE EXCLAMATION POINTS SPARINGLY
If you choose to use an exclamation point, use only one to convey excitement.
THINK TWICE BETWEEN HITTING REPLY ALL
No one wants to read 20 emails that have nothing to do with them.
BE CAUTIOUS WITH HUMOR
What may be funny when said out loud can come across differently when written. When in doubt, leave it out.
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FACE TO FACE
Tough sensitive issues really need to be communicated in person. Not having the opportunity to have a dialogue can be detrimental to a professional working relationship.
Communication that requires discussion doesn't work well electronically. And never use voicemail to avoid calls.
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Click here for the agency's Communication Guidelines. The comprehensive document includes information on using cell phones, answering the telephones, and following voicemail guidelines for office based and cell phones. Hard copies are available in each office.
Let's all do our part to adhere to communication messaging standards.
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AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENTS AND UPDATES
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Southborough Office Closed Saturday, June 27
Due to utility work being performed in and around 333 Turnpike Street, the Southborough office will be closed on Saturday, June 27. Staff who would normally be working out of the Southborough office during this time should plan to report to the Worcester office for the day.
Please note that Southborough office phone extensions will be unavailable during this time. There will be no disruption to Delta access or any network services, including phone extensions originating from other offices. The office will re-open Sunday, with phone capabilities restored, and staff should plan to report as usual.
Affected staff should contact their manager with any questions.
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MOVING FORWARD UPDATE
Issue 26 - June 11, 2015
I am very pleased to announce that Holly Thomas, MD, PhD has accepted the position of Regional Medical Director, South Region effective June 1, 2015. The south region includes Harvard Vanguard Quincy, Harvard Vanguard Braintree, Granite Medical Group (Quincy) and the Atrius Health regional specialty services located in Weymouth (Atrius Health Endoscopy Center, Atrius Health Cardiovascular Center, Atrius Health Pulmonary and Sleep Medicine, Atrius Health Imaging and Weymouth MRI.)
Dr. Thomas has practiced at Harvard Vanguard Braintree since 2009. In 2010, she was named Chief of Internal Medicine and in 2013 was appointed Site Medical Director. Prior to 2009, Dr. Thomas practiced as a primary care provider at Primary Care Affiliates associated with Signature Health Care and University of Massachusetts Medical Center.
Dr. Thomas attended the University of Massachusetts Medical School and received her PhD from Tufts University. She completed her medical training at University of Massachusetts Medical Center and her post-doctoral fellowship at Harvard Medical School where she remains a clinical instructor.
Dr. Thomas will serve as a member of the Atrius Health executive team and will have responsibility for the clinical operations of all sites in the south region. Dr. Thomas will continue as Site Medical Director for Harvard Vanguard Braintree and Dr. Nancy Drew (Site Medical Director, Granite Medical Group) and Dr. Christopher Post (Site Medical Director, Harvard Vanguard Quincy) will report to her. Additionally, Dr. Thomas will be responsible for developing and maintaining collaborative relationships with preferred hospitals in the region (South Shore Hospital and BID Hospital - Milton) as well as with specialty services within and outside of Atrius Health.
Please join me in congratulating Dr. Thomas on her new role and wishing her success in her future endeavors.
Bob Calway
Sr. Vice President, South Region
Send your questions about integration activities to Integration@AtriusHealth.org. Please note that, if you would like your question to be anonymous, you may indicate that and your name will not be shared beyond the one person who manages the mailbox.
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CLINICAL SERVICES
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Clinical Services Announcements and Updates
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Fallon Supply Update
Fallon Health has recently changed their policy regarding supply and DME ordering for their patients. Moving forward, clinicians ordering supplies/DME for Fallon patients are required to use the following vendors:
- pleurx catheters > Enos
- all other supplies and DME > Lakeview Medical.
As a reminder, Lakeview Medical is Reliant Health's preferred vendor for ALL supply/DME orders.
If you have any questions, or experience issues ordering through these vendors, please contact Linda Britt, Manager of Administrative Services, at 617-886-6302.
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IV Update: CADD Tubing from Coram
By Beth Mena, IV Clinical Service Manager
Please note that Coram will be sending out filtered tubing on all IV tubing for the CADD Prizm effective Monday June 16. Nurses may need to add the filter to the cassette tubing if it comes in 2 pieces.
This was a company wide decision by Coram to improve safety. If you have any questions, feel free to speak to a Coram pharmacist.
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New Behavioral Health Care Plans in Encore
By Christine Day, Clinical Applications Specialist
Three new Care Plans have been added to Encore for use by the Behavioral Health Nursing team.
The Problems are linked to Goals and Orders, and all codes begin with BH.
 Care Plan items with Codes beginning in BH should only be used by the Behavioral Health team.
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Best Practice Committee Monthly Update
By Joan Roth, Manager of Special Initiatives and Best Practice Committee Member
The VNAB is committed to the goal of reducing our rehospitalization rate. The agency's goal is to have all patients admitted by nursing to have their 2nd nursing visit within 48 hours of start of care. We will now be measuring this rate monthly for patients at high risk for hospitalizations.
For the month of May 2015, the agency's rate for having the second nursing visit within 48 hours of start of care for high-risk patients was 71%. This is higher than our rate for April, which was 70%.
We are also promoting two additional interventions that are best practices for keeping patients from being rehospitalized.
- The first best practice intervention is that continuity of care with providers improves patient outcomes. To support this practice we will be reporting on the percentage of patients who received their 2nd nursing visit by the nurse case manager. The rate for the month of May was 47%, which is lower than the rate for April, which was 50%
- The second best practice intervention is that the patient have a physician follow up visit within 7-14 days after a discharge from an acute care hospital. The rate for May was 75%, which is higher than the rate in April, which was 72%
Thanks for your continued efforts to keep patients out of the hospital particularly during the four weeks after they first come home from the hospital. The next report will be for the month of April.
Please remember that a great way to help keep our patient's out of the hospital is to provide telemonitoring for the high risk for rehospitalization patients. We now can provide monitoring for our COPD patients in addition to our Heart Failure patients. Please see your manager with any questions.
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FACILITIES
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Accidental 911 Calls
By Lorraine Potter, Director of Facilities
We are asking for your assistance with an issue that has been happening at least a couple of times a month, accidental 911 calls. The Worcester Police have been making frequent visits to our Thomas Street location after receiving 911 calls that are hung up shortly after being answered by an operator. Please note that this is most recently happening in the Worcester office, but has occurred at each of our other offices in the past.
911 can be easily dialed on our office phones by entering 911 or 9-911. The police are required to follow up on all 911 calls, whether they believe them to be legitimate or not. If you think you accidentally dialed, please do not hang up. Stay on the line and explain that you misdialed and did not mean to call them. It will save both them and us a visit.
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FUND DEVELOPMENT
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Celebrating 10 Years of Heroes in Health Care
VNA of Boston's Heroes in Health Care Gala marks its 10th anniversary this fall. The event honors leaders who have had a profound and sustained role in shaping our community, and has raised $2 million in essential funding for VNA of Boston's Maternal Child Health Program and Charitable Care Fund.
Fund Development kicked off the celebration with a Heroes Dinner, bringing together past and current honorees, board members, volunteers, and other supporters. Guest learned more about the agency's innovative services and the need for charitable gifts to support staff education, technology, and patient care.
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| Current and past Heroes in Health Care Honorees from left to right: Larry Jasinski, CEO of ReWalk and 2015 honoree; Mark Levin, partner at Third Rock Ventures and 2015 honoree; Ronald Walker, secretary of labor and workforce development for the Baker administration and past honoree; Susan Windham-Bannister, PhD, former president and CEO of the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center and past honoree; Joshua Boger, PhD, executive chairman of Alkeus Pharmaceuticals and past honoree; and Robert Tepper, MD, partner at Third Rock Ventures and 2015 honoree.
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(L-R) John Murphy, chair of the VNA of Boston and VNA Care Network boards of directors; Mary Ann O'Connor, president and CEO; and Denise Murphy
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(L-R) Shawnda Walker, 2013 honorary Gala co-chair and 2014 co-chair of the Gala's Fund the Mission, (left) and Lori Meagher, Gala co-chair, member of the VNA of Boston board of directors (Many staff may know Lori, founder and executive managing director of LRM Consulting Inc., from our workforce development initiative in the area of coaching.)
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You can learn more about Heroes in Health Care on VNA of Boston's website: www.bostonvna.org/gala. If you know someone who may be interested in supporting the benefit, please contact Laura Wise, manager of fund development, at lwise@vnab.org or 617-886-6460.
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HUMAN RESOURCES
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Employee Referral Bonus up to $5,000!
Employee referrals are often the most successful way for us to find the best candidates for open positions. Demand for physical therapists and nurses continues to be issue throughout the industry and the VNA is no exception.
In order to attract and retain new RNs and PTs, we are offering an employee referral bonus of up to $5,000!!! Certain conditions apply and the bonus will be paid in equal installments to eligible employees at the new recruits three and six month anniversaries.
Please contact Cheryl Milas at cmilas@vnacarenetwork.org or Debbie Brown at dbrown@vnab.org for more information.
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Job Postings - VNA of Boston and VNA Hospice Care
To learn more about career opportunities listed in the links above, contact Debbie Brown, Human Resources Manager at dbrown@vnab.org.
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Job Postings - VNA Care Network and VNA Hospice Care
To learn more about career opportunities, contact a human resources representative:
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Employee Advisory Team Suggestions
To suggest an area of focus to the Employee Advisory Team (EAT), please email your suggestion to EATSuggestionbox@vnab.org. Suggestions can include ideas to improve current processes and procedures, remove redundancies, or even to provide feedback on something you think is/is not working. Please feel free to discuss any issues that you would like brought to EAT with the following members of the committee:
- Ellen Cavalier
- Kelly Frew
- Mary Helen Mahoney
- Becky Manning
- Susan Marlin Procter
- Annemarie Martin
- Mary McCarthy
- Ilona O'Connor
- Mae Powers
- Maria Rodrigues
- David Rose
- Chris Schultz
- Danny Yan
EAT is also on the lookout for new members. If you're interested in participating, or for more information on what EAT is all about, please reach out to any of the members listed above. Meetings are held monthly and alternate between the Charlestown and Braintree offices.
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QUALITY AND RISK MANAGEMENT
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2nd Quarter OASIS Education
Below is the Quarter 2 OASIS education schedule for all offices. Our topic this quarter is Wounds. Mandatory attendance is expected for all clinical professionals. You may attend any site but be sure to sign in on the attendance so you will get credit for attendance. If you do not attend any of the sessions, you will need to complete the makeup test and have a meeting with the PCM in your district to be sure you are understand the Q2 content.
The Quality Department is committed to ensuring the CMS guidelines are used in our clinical practice to our patients. Thank you to all our staff for their continued clinical commitment to understanding OASIS and reaching for the best outcomes for our patients.
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VNA HOSPICE CARE
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Norm Stockwell Retires
We were both happy and sad to announce that Norm Stockwell has officially retired from his position in Marketing and Development at the VNA Hospice Care after 11 years.
Throughout the years, Norm has not only been a great employee, but a good friend to us, and his enjoyable presence in the office will surely be missed. We had a celebration at the end of May to wish him well. We'll be seeing you, Norm!
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