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Family Satisfaction from the 7th to 75th Percentile in 12 Months
In 12 short months, Sharp Hospice Care—which is part of Sharp Healthcare, San Diego's largest health care system—has boosted family satisfaction from the 7th to the 75th percentile (Press-Ganey) and pain control from the
1st to the 88th percentile. Sharp Hospice Care has an average daily census of 250 patients, annual admissions of 1600
patients, and an average length of stay of 54 days. Employee turnover is just 2%.
"Sharp Hospice has been on a journey
to service and operational excellence with the
Sharp Experience for the last six years, but we
recognized we needed to adapt the tools we were
using to the needs of a more virtual hospice
environment to get these gains," explains Suzi
Johnson, RN, MPH and vice president of Sharp
Hospice Care. "We struggled for several years to
define the key pieces and really hardwire behaviors
until they were used with every patient and
family every time."
Hardwiring a Culture of Service
At Sharp Hospice, a culture of service starts
with employee empowerment and accountability.
When nurses said it would be helpful
if printers were attached to laptops to print
medication profiles for patients during home
visits, Sharp delivered...improving patient safety
and communication among interdisciplinary
teams while also impressing patients and families
with their responsiveness.
Likewise, staff are evaluated on areas they
can impact. Performance expectations are
aligned both vertically and horizontally. For
example, since the hospice vice president is responsible for family satisfaction, accountability
cascades to all hospice staff who are responsible
for family evaluations on specific questions on
family satisfaction surveys.
Each member of the team has responsibility
for responses to specific questions on the family
satisfaction survey. For example, nurses are
responsible for answers to two questions: "How
well the nurse taught you to care for the patient”
and control of patient pain. Home health aides
are responsible for "Aide’s concern for patient's
comfort" and social workers are responsible for
"Your rating of the social worker". Likewise,
chaplains are responsible for "Your rating
of the chaplain".
Using Key Words at Key Times
Key words at key times are a Must-Have
for service excellence. Even though staff at
Sharp Hospice were initially resistant to using
"scripted" words, they have come to see the
impact these words have on patient and
family satisfaction. Key words also imprint a
greater consciousness of service excellence by
hardwiring consistency into each and every
patient/family interaction. In a similar way, using AIDET—or the Five Fundamentals of Service—also raises patient and family satisfaction by communicating respect, communication, appreciation, and confidence. |