As part of the continued commitment to quality, St Francis Regional Medical Center invited the Joint Commission to survey the hospital and recertify the heart failure program. St. Francis is one of only two hospitals in the state with a certified heart failure program; the other is United Hospital in St. Paul. The surveyor was impressed with the great people and excellent work and found an amazing zero RFI’s (requirements for improvement). “This is a rare event that can only happen with a cohesive team focused on the patient, this is a proud day for our St. Francis team” said Nancy Wolf, St. Francis Quality & Safety Director.
The nurse surveyor met with staff from various departments including ED, Inpatient Care, and Special Care Unit (formerly ICU); an extra thank you to Nancy Pint, RN Inpatient Care, John McKowan, RN SCU, and Dawn Krauss, RN ED. The survey investigates five areas: program management, delivery of care, self-management education, critical information documentation, and performance measures. Along with a detailed analysis of our knowledge and procedures, the surveyor conducted five patient tracers and shared best of practice ideas from around the country. She plans to share some of the learnings from St. Francis with others, including: MARTTI (My Accessible Real Time Trusted Interpreter) translation TV unit, patient education by the pharmacist, interdisciplinary rounding, After Visit Summary (AVS), robust nursing education, our living well with chronic conditions class and the InstyMeds machine in the ED.
The surveyor was particularly impressed with the extra commitment of Nancy Pint, RN and Jamie Wozny, RN as two of the 13 certified heart failure nurses in Minnesota. She also had rave reviews of our palliative care program, led by Julie Such, NP and how it is supported by our entire organization.
Moving forward in 2013, lead Erin Kiernan-Johnson, RN will retire two heart failure measures since they are now officially hardwired; low sodium diets and discharge instructions. These will be replaced with depression screening and recommendations for outpatient provider goals. The work on palliative care and readmission work will continue throughout the year.
“We owe this honor to all of the staff and providers’ commitment to patient care and the heart failure program, thank you” said Kiernan-Johnson, RN.