CEO wanted a positive outreach’
The CEO of Community Hospital in Grand Junction, CO, "always felt it was a wonderful idea to have one person responsible for helping patient guests before, during, and after their stay," says Erica Eng, patient advocate and director of guest services.
That philosophy led to the creation of Eng’s job a little more than a year ago. "It was conceived as being a kind of concierge [position]," she explains.
Hospitals frequently get calls that have little to do with health care, Eng points out. "If you talk to people at different hospitals, you find their switchboards get calls like this all the time," she adds. Randall M. Phillips, the hospital’s CEO, envisioned a director of guest services who could help with those issues, Eng says. "He wanted to make it a positive outreach."
When she gets calls from people who have financial problems, for example, Eng recommends a local nonprofit group that provides free legal services, she says. To those who need help caring for someone in the home but don’t qualify for home health services, Eng adds, she might suggest Time Bank, where people put in volunteer time and in turn have time donated to them. Another caller might be directed to a local clinic that provides free or discounted services.
It’s not unusual for her to help people who never set foot in the hospital, she says. "Case managers and the emergency department field an amazing number of calls from people who are just in need."
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