EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
A Maryland hospital is reporting success with a daily safety call. Attendees report safety issues, receive updates, and can act quickly on concerns.
- The call is limited to 30 minutes.
- Some issues are resolved during the call or soon after.
- A wide range of hospital leaders attend the call.
A Maryland hospital found that a highly structured daily safety conference call with key clinicians and administrators can significantly improve patient safety.
For the past year, Luminis Health Anne Arundel Medical Center has conducted a daily safety call Monday through Friday at 9:30 a.m., with 60 clinical leaders and administrators invited. The call usually lasts about 25 minutes and has a strict limit of 30 minutes, explains Christine Frost, RN, MSN/MBA, NEA-BC, chief nursing officer and vice president.
Frost typically runs the call and uses a structured conversation format to make it efficient and productive. The group usually discusses a couple of ongoing topics, and then some attendees make presentations on other issues. After that, the meeting is opened to allow recognition of achievements, milestones, and other noteworthy announcements from different units.
“That’s a great way to kind of kick off the day because we’re constantly running around and it just sort of puts a positive spin on that safety call. It also give folks an opportunity to recognize each other and recognize their teams,” Frost says. “Then we launch into the safety portion, with me very deliberately asking if there are any current safety concerns, anything overnight that occurred that you would need to report out in this forum. We hear about safety concerns across the entire organization — anything related to staff safety or patient safety.”
The representative leaders from those departments can acknowledge the issue, take accountability, and then follow up when the issue is resolved, Frost says. Sometimes, that happens quickly, and a resolution can be provided while still on the call. Or, someone can tell the representative that they will call them directly after the meeting to discuss the problem, or that someone is on the way immediately to address it. Other updates or resolutions are emailed or announced on a following call.
“It’s really neat that people can say, ‘I know every day I’m going to hop on a safety call at 9:30 and I can report things and have an expectation that an accountable party is going to is going to address that safety concern for me as an employee,’” Frost says.
The last topic for the call is the daily update on capacity, leading to any staffing concerns, which links closely with safety, Frost says. Once a week, the call includes an update from infection prevention on hospitalizations and trends.
“It is a very collaborative, very robust discussion. The president of the organization closes this out at the end and usually also recognizes the effort and the team,” Frost says. “It really is a forum where we have learned to be very transparent, raising safety concerns, and also creating that closed-loop communication so that we are aware when things are resolved, or what the action plan is to get them resolved.”
Attendees include clinical directors who oversee specific areas, local unit leaders, system roles, and key administrators. A representative from the hospital’s patient family advisors program attends.
“Probably once every couple of months, I get an email from that patient’s family advisor making recommendations about how the call is managed and then also recommendations around something that was reported. I think that’s just a really great demonstration of how intentional we are and how much our culture is focused on creating open lines of communication,” Frost says. “Here’s a community member who is functioning as a patient family advisor and feels comfortable reaching out to me electronically to say, ‘I think that maybe we could look at this differently.’ That’s exactly why we include them in all of the work that we do.”
Rounds and Huddles
The work does not end when the daily safety call is complete. Three times a week, purposeful safety rounds are booked from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. The rounds include the president, Frost, the chief medical officer, the chief operating officer, and additional leaders across the organization. They visit at least two — and usually three — departments.
“We go to where the work is happening and we provide a summary of what was reported on safety calls, a summary of any employee injuries so that we are having conversations with our employees about how to stay safe in the workplace,” Frost says. “We also ask them to report any safety concerns that they are experiencing in their workplace. Our intent there is really to be visible, accessible, have open lines of communication, and then also empower the staff to problem solve when it’s appropriate.”
Luminis also has shift change huddles every morning and evening, plus a twice-daily bed board to address capacity and staffing. The unit-level huddles are typically attended by everyone on the outgoing and incoming teams. They usually last about three to five minutes and follow the same basic format as the daily safety calls.
“They’re a little bit more rapid-fire because folks are trying to hand off and either leave for the day or get their day started,” Frost says. “But the goal is the same as with our daily safety call. We want to share information that will help us improve patient safety, employee safety, and quality of care.”
SOURCE
- Christine Frost, RN, MSN/MBA, NEA-BC, Chief Nursing Officer and Vice President, Luminis Health Anne Arundel Medical Center, Annapolis, MD. Phone: (443) 481-1000.
A Maryland hospital found that a highly structured daily safety conference call with key clinicians and administrators can significantly improve patient safety. Attendees report safety issues, receive updates, and can act quickly on concerns.
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