You did not reach your target level.you descend to the level of your system. – James Clear, Atomic Habits.
Our health care results tell us we’ve fallen to the level of our system.
With heightened attention to Covid and workforce pressures, in many cases the usual issues of quality and safety are overlooked or overwhelmed.As a result, the healthcare system’s progress in improving quality and safety metrics over the years has lost ground, as evidenced by recent evidence security data And countless reports of setbacks.
Even as we recover from severe Covid fatigue, missed handovers, cumbersome processes and administrative fatigue (to name a few) are not uncommon. This model can demoralize, overwhelm, and, yes, feel exhausted, healthcare personnel. We acknowledge the cumulative impact experienced by the workforce, who continue to see the same challenges, mistakes and inefficiencies crop up time and time again.
A return to “normal” isn’t all that comforting for the workforce, because “normal” didn’t work before the pandemic, and it won’t work now.
Instant solution
Organizations dedicated to improving patient safety and quality by empowering healthcare workers include the American Hospital Association, which in its 2022 Advocacy Agenda:
- Help ensure hospitals and health systems have the necessary workforce to continue caring for patients and communities during the Covid-19 surge.
- Investigating reports of anticompetitive behavior at nurse staffing agencies during the pandemic, which has further exacerbated severe labor shortages.
- Address nursing shortages and burnout by supporting the recruitment, retention, and advanced education of nurses and other allied health professionals by reauthorizing nursing workforce development programs.
We applaud these efforts and acknowledge that they can take months and years to have an impact.
Today’s opportunity is for healthcare managers to grasp these issues immediately and begin to make an impact on strengthening the workforce by improving system sustainability.
Sustainable systems, processes and structures help ensure continuity in the face of known and unknown challenges, such as labor shortages. Crucial to this are clearly defined stakeholder roles and responsibilities that are built around proven competency standards. If we are to maintain jobs, we need to have a reference point about what a job “is.” We need executive buy-in to ensure workforce quality and safety capabilities move to and remain at the top of organizational priority lists.
result
Addressing quality and safety roles and structures is the first step towards sustainability.with NAHQ’s competency frameworkorganizations can provide essential employees with structure and a shared vocabulary and toolkit that was previously missing – especially important in a healthcare environment faced with doing more with less.
exist life, according to Nidia Williams, vice president of quality and safety, frontline safety initiatives are increasing incident reporting and leading to higher employee engagement.In addition, the lifespan $7 million recovered By improving quality first initiatives such as “trash trail.
NAHQ Conducted Fall 2021 study Learn how healthcare quality professionals are leveraging PPI tools, methodologies and mindsets during Covid-19. Healthcare quality professionals clearly recognize the value of PPI (performance and process improvement) approaches and the expertise needed to effectively implement them to manage rapid change: 71% say improvement approaches are working in their organization during the pandemic increased in.
Focusing on equipping the workforce with the necessary skills and competencies to meet long-standing and new challenges in healthcare is the shortest path to improving safety and reducing burnout.
Not only that, but the focus on advanced training has also fostered academic research in the field, further advancing the knowledge base of quality and safety disciplines. Focusing on improvements today can also create the seeds of wisdom with which to build the future. In fact, some leading universities already offer graduate degree programs in healthcare quality and safety. By working together, they are practicing what they preach to continually review the curriculum and collaborate to improve it, as we should all do.
bring back purpose
To restore the purpose of the workforce and reactivate the “calling” that led to this career choice, we must place the healthcare workforce in the situations where they are most likely to succeed. They have to see their leaders support them, and they have to feel the impact of that support for themselves as they serve their patients every day.
Our people are not the problem, our unsustainable systems are the problem, including our activation around workforce development.
Leaders should aspire to unlock human potential in the healthcare workforce and achieve a degree of system sustainability that better prepares their organizations for future challenges. Executive engagement and sponsorship of workforce development in quality and safety is a vital task leaders should initiate now.
Photo: Juan Monino, Getty Images
