Team Showcase:

2008 Team Showcase Competition: Region 6

2008 Region 6 Winner

Region Six A Powerful Culture of Safety North Broward Medical Center Deerfield Beach

A Powerful Culture of Safety

North Broward Medical Center strives to provide the community it serves with safe, quality health care.   In alignment with this goal, the hospital chose to create a robust culture of safety as we serve a high volume of patients and realize the risk for a medical error.  The objective of the team was to create and promote a culture of safety where best practices are hardwired in the behavior of all hospital staff and to involve the patients, families and visitors.  Performance measures, including patient satisfaction, infections due to medical care and medication safety, were targeted to meet and exceed regional and national benchmarks for patient safety.

The project started with the hospital’s Quality Council performing a Priority Analysis to determine opportunities for process improvement.  Five of the top ten opportunities identified involved patient safety, specifically, Positive Patient Identification, Infections Due to Medical Care and Medication Management. 
A Patient Safety Lead Team was established to analyze data, develop process improvement teams with internal and external stakeholder involvement for the above opportunities and oversee the progress of each team. 

The teams followed a process improvement methodology where they assessed the problem, determined root causes, designed solutions, implemented solutions and evaluated the results.  They began by flowcharting processes, completing cause and effect diagrams and multivoting to determine root causes.  It was identified we had inconsistent processes with obtaining and verifying patient identification, inserting central lines (an intravenous line in a large vein that leads directly to the heart), hand hygiene and safe medication storage. 

Each team proceeded by brainstorming solutions and researching best practices. The chosen solutions were then piloted in various patient care areas in the hospital.  Data was collected and those solutions that positively impacted each process were selected as final solutions and implemented house wide.  The Positive Patient Identification Team scripted staff to accurately obtain patient information and actively involve the patient in verifying the information throughout the continuum of care.  The Infections Due to Medical Care Team launched a hand hygiene campaign to include hospital staff, physicians, patients and visitors and standardized the central line insertion process.  And the Medication Management Team reorganized medication storage areas and designated “Quiet Zones” to reduce work interruptions. 

Our team’s success was validated by data and patient satisfaction surveys.  All performance measures for Patient Identification, Infections Due to Medical Care and Medication Management have met or exceeded goals.  The organization has also experienced cost savings, both direct and indirect, with the prevention of medical errors.  With the implementation of new systems and revision of workflow, North Broward Medical Center has truly transformed into a safer, high quality health care facility.

Counties in Region 6: Broward, Dade, Monroe, Palm Beach