Frontline Managers

• Assigning a point person to work with physicians and departments to ensure patients have the needed lab orders
• Coordinating efforts across the multiple departments that engage in a patient's treatment
• Assigning a backup assistant to ensure the point duties are covered

What can your team do to identify where things "fall through the cracks"? What else could your team do to put the patient at the center? 

• Standardizing note-taking styles across the team
• Assigning a financial counselor to each in-need patient
• Working with Admitting Department to identify patients who need assistance and provide counseling

What can your team do to reduce unneeded variation? And what can your team do to work with other teams to improve service? 

• Following the successful practice of another team that solved the same problem
• Offering kid-friendly food like peanut butter and jelly sandwiches
• Creating restaurant style menus with imagery of zoo animals

What can your team do to listen to the voice of the patient? And how could your team learn from other teams that have tackled challenges similar to yours?

• Creating computer spreadsheet to track inventory and order supplies
• Labeling shelves and supplies more clearly to reduce clutter
• Eliminating hoarding and rarely used supplies, and consolidating orders

What can your team do to harness the power of technology? What else could your team do to centralize information that is scattered? 

• Assessing the problem and working together to a solution
• Converting extra closet space into a dressing room for patients
• Realizing even small solutions pay large dividends

 What can your team do to use your physical space more efficiently? 

• Creating call lists for patients at risk for hypertension
• Targeting diabetic patients, who often overlook high blood pressure symptoms
• Having clinical assistants chip in to check blood pressure and outreach

What can your team do to reach out to patients proactively? What else could your team do to help patients manage chronic conditions?

• Placing a Gratitude Jar in the entrance of the department (a prominent position)
• “Planting” a Gratitude Tree on a wall
• Buying playful fruit-shaped sticky notes to write their gratitude messages and post on the tree 

What can your team do to measure and reduce stress? 

• Creating a "tick sheet" for staff to note how much paper and toner is wasted
• Figuring how often IT is called and how many patients are affected
• Getting authorization for newer and more efficient printers

What can your team do to build a business case for better equipment? What else could your team do to reduce wasted time and effort?

• Establishing a baseline measurement for how long moms are getting skin-to-skin contact with their new babies
• Creating talking points of the benefits for both new baby and mother about this critical bonding
• Communicating with staff to ensure a minimum of 60 minutes of skin-to-skin contact occurs post delivery

 What can your team do to explain the "why" behind what you are doing? 

• Using a checklist of important topics as a teaching tool for new parents at discharge with their new baby
• Speaking with them at a time when they are most likely to understand and take in the information
• Creating a script for nurses that doesn't feel rehearsed or fake

What can your team do to improve your communication with patients?