Will frontline staff really have input into CST?
We’re looking forward to our next All-Staff Forum on October 30th (3 to 4 pm). We’ll devote some of the forum to the topic of our People First survey results and employee engagement, but we also want to talk about what’s top of mind for you.
Email us your conversation topic or agenda suggestion by October 6 to: VancouverAll-StaffForum@vch.ca.
More answers to your questions
We continue to receive and answer your questions about VCH finances and more. Read on for our latest batch of answers. For earlier answers, read our September 26 article and previously published submissions to VCH News-Vancouver.
If you have a question about delivering quality health care services while tackling our budget challenge, we encourage you to email VancouverAll-StaffForum@vch.ca. We welcome your questions.
To learn more about our plans and direction; consult our interactive Vancouver Strategic Plan.
Today’s answered questions
Q. Are there really frontline staff involved in the new online charting system we are going to implement?
A. Will frontline staff have input into CST? Yes, most definitely. The Clinical and Systems Transformation (CST) project team is currently finalizing the planning for how we’re going to design, build and integrate this clinical information system. Physicians and staff — including point-of-care clinical staff — across all three partner organizations (VCH, PHC and PHSA) and are part of this. Frontline staff will have opportunities to get involved as part of work streams related to medication management and documentation. We’ll also need subject matter experts at various times throughout the project, depending on what is being designed. We’re seeking people who can think big picture, and provide constructive feedback about desired workflow and practices we want to implement. If you’re interested in contributing, please let your immediate supervisor know. For more on CST, read the latest issue of CST News.
Q. How do the True North goals of “promoting better health for our communities,” “providing the best care,” “innovating for sustainability,” and “developing the best workforce” align with the recent budget cuts to community health?
A. If there’s one constant in health care, it’s that change is necessary to ensure that we remain responsive to our public’s ever-evolving health care needs. And although it’s not always easy, change is the way we respond to the four strategic goals that you’ve outlined in your question. Let’s take the recent closure of the Art Studio, for instance. Although the studio will remain in operation — thanks to private funding — until Spring 2014 to allow development of a service replacement plan, we made the decision to close it based on other competing and emerging priorities. While the Art Studio was much loved, we needed to capture resources from it in order to fund a new and much-needed treatment modality for the growing number of hard-to-reach mental health clients who are increasingly calling Vancouver their home. By harvesting dollars from the Art Studio, we were able to fund another two ACT Teams. This service reorganization allowed us to: a) promote better health for our communities; b) provide the best care; and c) develop the best workforce. By increasing the number of ACT Teams, we are also innovating for sustainability by treating these clients in their homes rather than in our EDs, which frees up precious in-hospital resources for clients that require acute hospital-based care.
Of course, we’re also having to make difficult choices to achieve savings. But, as the Art Studio example illustrates, in some cases we’re reallocating funds from existing programs and services to alternate organizational priorities. These reallocated funds are augmenting services where demand is high. In other cases, we’re creating new services where none existed before. For instance, we’ll soon be unveiling a new addiction treatment day program that will expand recovery options for those whose lives make it difficult to attend a residential recovery program. And we’re doing this within existing funding envelopes.
Q. Why do we pay for ongoing LEAN projects when the LEAN providers seem to end up disappearing before any changes that will result in cost savings are made?
A. You may be familiar with this proverb: “Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day; show him how to catch a fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.” We think it sums up our approach to Lean implementation quite nicely. Here’s why:
At VCH, we’re fortunate to have a highly experienced team of Lean experts as a resource to us — and at no charge to local teams who engage them. In Vancouver alone, we keep the Lean team very busy. With so much demand for Lean work, we can’t expect the organization’s Lean coordinators and advisors to be everywhere at once. More importantly, we can’t rely on them entirely to achieve our goals if we truly want to become Lean. With their help, we want to become self-sufficient and that includes implementing action plans and evaluating their effectiveness independently.
On page 16 of Vancouver’s Strategic Plan, you’ll find a brief overview of Vancouver’s three-part strategy for Lean implementation. There, you’ll read about our plans to learn how to “fish” for ourselves. Ultimately, we’re aiming for all programs to manage their Lean projects independently from beginning to end. And, in time, we all should have the knowledge and tools to apply Lean principles as just another part of our everyday work.
Having said that, the VCH Lean Transformation Services team is always there for expert advice. If you ever have a question about how best to apply Lean tools or principles, or if your project stalls, please don’t hesitate to contact the team.