EP30-14 1/11/13 Brainstorming Session for Reducing Injuries in the Workplace.

Present: Sue Jardon, Director of Rehabilitation; Frank Hennessy, Manager Business Development; Deborah Burell, Occupational Therapist; Heidi Bouwens RN;Sherrie Gray RN; John Martin, Certified Rehabilitation Therapist

As a group we came together and discussed current Workman Compensation claims throughout Centura and Adventist via information and statistics provided by Catholic Health Initiatives (CHI). Thank you very much to Sherrie and Heidi for obtaining this information (It is a first for both entities to share information and report). Our goals have been identified as:

  1. Creating a culture of educating staff and family on wellness and injury prevention, and to create a demand for a culture of health and injury prevention.
  2. Recognizing the aging workplace and workforce and the modifications that need to be addressed with the changing times.
  3. Identification of floors and “hot spot” areas where RN’s appear to be incurring the most injuries in the workplace. See below on action items.

In conclusion, we decided that Deb B and John M will observe the floors listed below and speak to manager of that floor and nurses as well. They will be working to stay under the radar and gather pertinent data with the goals of creating practical solutions that will have buy in by the staff as well hopefully be low cost in terms of correcting potential danger areas on the identified floors. Deb B and John M will coordinate directly with Heidi B and Sherrie G. It was made clear by Sue that it is ok for Deb and John to be at the disposal of Heidi and Sherrie to assist with this project as able.

Action Items:

1.Please no equipment to be purchased, unless it first goes through Occupational Health

2.Next meeting will be set for Mid-February to determine progress

3.Sherrie G, Heidi B, Deb B and John M will share calendars

4.Current Policy and Procedures for patient handling will be e-mailed to John M by Sherrie.

5.Deb B and John M will contact Heidi B to set up times to look at potential safety issues and meet with manager of:

  1. 11 th floor at Main
  2. 5th Floor at SFMC
  3. ICU main
  4. Patient transport at main

6.John M will speak to Barb Gibbons about getting a meeting time in February for all of us to re-convene.

Thank you and I apologize ahead of time for any information that I may have left out.

John Martin