Quarterly - Trillium Health Centre

Quarterly
a newsletter from the President and CEO
SPRING 2010
CEO Update
Janet Davidson, O.C., BScN, MHSA, LLD (Hon)
President and CEO, Trillium Health Centre
The Report Card
Stats from the previous quarter
The Emergency Department (ED) continues
to focus its efforts on improving
wait times. In December, ED Wait Times
improved based on the targets set for us
as a result of increased physician hours,
a new Rapid Assessment Zone and new
Post Construction Operation Plan beds.
The organization is focusing on sustainable
improvements through multiple
strategies, particularly broad organizational
flow initiatives that include
overcapacity protocols.
Over the holiday period, the number
of Alternative Level of Care (ALC)
patients increased. In early January, 11
long-term care (LTC) homes were experiencing
outbreaks. Combined with LTC
bed closures and seasonal staffing
varia tions, backlogs were created in
hospitals for patients who should have
been transferred to long-term care. In
January, the average number of ALC
patients increased to 67. We continue to
work in partnership with the CCAC
towards reducing the number of ALC
patients.
By the numbers, third quarter
2009-2010
Patient visits 561,623
Inpatient admissions 24,167
Outpatient visits
(excl. ER & Urgent Care) 224,588
Outpatient diagnostic
services 238,689
Emergency visits 59,855
Urgent Care Centre visits 38,491
Surgical procedures 27,179
Physicians 714
Staff 4,300
Volunteers 1,100
Beds 770
We’re helping people Feel Better Faster,
whether or not they’re our patients.
In the not-too-distant past, hospitals were
silos – places for sick people, divorced
from the family, the community and
other health-related resources.
Now, hospitals are health centres, part
of an integrated system of resources that
works in partnership to, first and foremost,
keep people healthy. And when health
falters, we work together to heal or help
people manage chronic illness for the best
possible quality of life.
There is evidence of this change all
around us.
In April, we officially named our
new GlaxoSmithKline Chronic Disease
Management and Prevention Centre.
The Centre will teach coping skills to
those living with chronic diseases like
diabetes, asthma, chronic obstructive
pulmonary disease, congestive heart
failure and hepatitis.
Trillium has also joined forces with
The Credit Valley Hospital, Halton
Healthcare Services and the Mississauga
Halton CCAC to launch a campaign
designed to assist people in finding
the right health care option when they
need help.
Focusing on people who use emergency
departments when other health care
options would help them Feel Better Faster,
the awareness campaign offers easy access
to information about family doctors,
24-hour pharmacies, walk-in/after-hours
clinics and home care, community and
long-term care services.
People who could have made these
other choices comprise one-third of all
emergency department visits in 2008/09.
Helping people make the right choice
will reduce emergency department wait
times for those who need to be there.
Visit www.feelbetterfaster.ca.
This year, Trillium has also launched
Health Talks, a series of free educational
seminars designed to engage people
managing their own health.
Health Talks, open to all members of the
community, focus on specific health issues
and feature presentations from Trillium
experts and specialists. Living Life to the
Fullest with Diabetes took place April 22.
The next Health Talk topic is Older
Adults: Living your Best Quality of Life.
It will take place at Trillium – West
Toronto on Wednesday, June 16 at
6:30 p.m. Our past Health Talks were
a sold-out success and are available to
watch at www.trilliumhealthcentre.org
and on YouTube.
Finally, we’re partnering more closely
with The Credit Valley Hospital as
our respective senior teams identify
opportunities to work together to drive
quality of care improvements.
In April, Trillium and Credit Valley
announced joint directorships in
Diagnostic Imaging, Laboratory Services
and Pharmacy. Each of these shared
directors will lead the organizations in
planning and implementing integrated
clinical support services to achieve more
effective operations.
Taken together, these initiatives and those
still on the drawing board are evidence
of a welcome new day not only for our
patients but for the broader community
that we serve.

Quarterly
a newsletter from the President and CEO – PAGE 2
Shift
a column of news briefs about changes,
challenges, people and projects
Spotlight on
Breakfast with the President
Coffee, muffins and conversation are
on the agenda once a month when
Janet Davidson invites 12 to 15 randomly
selected Trillium employees,
physicians and volunteers to join her
for breakfast.
After providing a “where we are now”
update, Janet invites guests to discuss
whatever is on their minds.
“I wanted an opportunity to spend
time with employees, physicians and
volunteers who work throughout the
hospital – to get to know them better
as people and to hear about their daily
work, their ideas, achievements and,
yes, their con cerns, first hand. I appreciate
how frank the conversations have
been,” she says. “I also hope they get
to know each other a little better.” ◆
Celebrating our Volunteers
They are 1,000 people strong and last
year they donated more than 100,000
hours of their time to support Trillium
Health Centre programs. They are
Trillium's volunteers, honoured April 22
at a Recognition Dinner in conjunction
with National Volunteer Week.
Ann Mackay, who has served Trillium
and its predecessor Queensway
General Hospital for 55 years, received
a special award from President and
CEO Janet Davidson and Mississauga’s
Mayor Hazel McCallion. Barbara Peden,
Margot Sabow and Barbara Patterson
were also recognized for their 50, 45
and 40 years of service respectively.
Other special awards included the
Student Volunteer of the Year Award,
presented to Pereya Kulasegaram.
At the dinner, fellow volunteer and
Board Chair Anne Sado, told guests that
Trillium Health Centre – and its two
predecessors – was founded on the
strength and dedication of volunteers.
“They started from scratch,” she said.
“Without their efforts, then and
now, Trillium would not be what it is
today.” ◆
Big Dots
Trillium Health Centre follows the dots.
“Big Dots” are a short-cut to better
performance management: If you want
to accurately and objectively assess
how an organization is doing in terms
of its vision, progress is measured in
numbers.
Trillium monitors its performance –
hand hygiene compliance rates or central
line infection rates, for example
– by calculating percentages. Those
percentages are included in charts and
become points on a line, month over
month, year over year. These points or
“dots” are reliable indicators of actual
performance compared to the targets
we have set for ourselves or have been
set for us.
In the area of Quality and Patient Safety,
the Big Dots are focused on hospital
standardized mortality ratio, emergency
department wait times, pressure
ulcers and patient satisfaction. ◆
Seniors Symposium
“Transforming Seniors Care: Within,
Between and Beyond”, a conference
focused on moving from ideas to
action in health care for older adults,
will take place June 23 and 24 at
Trillium Health Centre.
Seniors health and wellness is a key
longer-term strategy at Trillium.
“We’re committed to exploring opportunities
to advance excellence in
seniors’ health,” says Patti Cochrane,
Vice President, Patient Services &
Quality and Chief Nursing Officer.
A keynote speaker for the event, which
is expected to draw more than 100
participants from health care, educational
and community service organizations
in the Mississauga Halton area,
will be Dennis Kodner, Ph.D., a noted
gerontologist and eldercare innovator.
Dr. Barbara Clive, a geriatrician at The
Credit Valley Hospital and Geriatric
Lead for the Mississauga Halton LHIN,
will also speak. ◆
Positive Deviance
Solutions to a community’s most
difficult problems are often
hidden in plain sight.
That’s the underlying philosophy of Positive
Deviance (PD), a change methodology pioneered
in Vietnam nearly two decades ago in a last-ditch
effort to combat the malnutrition that afflicted
65 per cent of the country’s children. Today, PD is
being put to work in the service of reducing rates
of hospital-acquired infections among patients.
In the 1990s, Tufts University nutrition professor,
Marian Zeitlin documented the existence of
“Positive Deviant” children in poor communities
– children who were better nourished than others.
Despite being limited to the same resources as
others in the community, the children fared better
because of their parents’ exceptional behaviour
and practices. Dr. Zeitlin’s work led to a sustained
65 to 80% reduction in childhood mal nutrition
in Vietnamese communities and, in the years
since, the approach has significantly reduced
childhood malnutrition in 41 countries around
the world. PD has also been used to reduce high
school drop out rates, teen-aged pregnancies and
prevent HIV/AIDS in sex workers.
Now, Trillium is one of six Canadian sites for
the Canadian PD Project, an 18-month pilot
designed to determine if Positive Deviance
can help Canadian hospitals tackle C-diff and
MRSAs. The Trillium PD team is led by Louise
Koyanagi, lead nurse at Trillium’s Betty Wallace
Women’s Health Centre.
“Positive Deviance is a practical, strength-based
approach that looks not at what’s going wrong
but at what’s going right. It leads us to think about
existing resources in a different way. Individuals
and units will be able to overcome the problem of
infection rates without special resources,” Louise
Koyanagi says.
“The purpose of the project is not to give people
ideas but rather to allow them to discover their own
existing Positive Deviant practices and apply them
universally.”
www.trilliumhealthcentre.org