Committee Update
Quality, Safety and Care Improvement Committee:
Fostering a culture that promotes commitment to continuous improvement of patient/family centered care, quality and safety.
The BWH Quality, Safety and Care Improvement Committee is a diverse group of nurses from various areas of the hospital that meets once a month to discuss quality and safety issues. Over the last six months, this group has worked together to identify specific patient and staff educational needs related to quality and safety initiatives, as well as those systems and processes requiring improvement to advance patient/family care through changes in practice.
This work is being accomplished through a number of educational sessions provided to the committee that demonstrates how quality improvement processes can affect care through practice changes. For example, the electronic upgrades to the medication reconciliation process supported an increase in the development of PAMLs for improved medication reviews at the bedside, and how quadramed completion and reliability can affect better decision making on the units and within the department. The committee members saw how the quality improvement methodology uses data to drive decision making through the review of data from a variety of surveys including falls prevalence, restraint prevalence, pressure ulcer prevalence and hand hygiene.
The most recent project involved working with Biomedical Engineering on enhancements to improve the process of identifying, labeling and requesting repair of broken equipment. Revisions were made to the BWH yellow repair tags in an effort to ensure Biomed receives all the necessary information required to effectively repair equipment in a timely fashion for needed use on the units. As part of this project, initiatives were identified to help staff understand the importance of completing the tag by including the use of the repair tags during unit orientation for the RN, PCA, and unit coordinator. The revised tags will be presented at the nurse manager, nurse educator, and nursing operations supervisor meetings to reinforce the necessity and availability of the tags on all units.
For suggestions or inquires, please contact co-chairs Stephanie Capello, RN, and Mary Antonelli, RN, or Diane Lancaster, RN, advisor. The QSCI committee meets the second Tuesday of every month, 3:30 - 5:30 p.m.