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BBGH and BBHF award $10,000 in scholarships

BBGH Board of Trustees Chairman Tom Furman, DVM, MS, holds the proclamation he just signed making May TeamSTEPPS Month. Standing with him, left to right, are BBGH TeamSTEPPS Master Trainers Mary Mockerman, Kristi Ellstrom, Summer Gonzales and Dede DeVeny.

This past month, Box Butte General Hospital (BBGH) and Box Butte Health Foundation (BBHF) awarded $10,000 in scholarships to 15 worthy individuals seeking careers in health care. The recipients were announced Monday night at the BBGH Board of Trustees meeting by Chief Nursing Officer Carolyn Jones. Ms. Jones reported that $5,000 in $1,000 scholarships was awarded by BBHF to college students, and $5,000 in $500 scholarships were awarded by BBGH to 10 senior high graduates. She added that since 2004, when BBGH, the BBGH Auxiliary and then BBHF first started offering scholarships, 46 people have received one, with 12 being current employees and that many more being previous employees.  Some of the 46 recipients are still in college. The awardees for 2017, their school of choice, and career path plan follows:

College recipients: Aleece Calarco-Wagner, BBGH employee in Lab, will attend Barton Community College for Medical Laboratory Tech; Regg Strotheide, Hay Springs, University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC), Physical Therapist, Doctorate of Physical Therapy; Amber Schulze, BBGH employee in ED, UNMC, Family Nurse Practitioner; Karli Farritor, Hastings College, Speech Pathologist; Jacqueline Walker, Chadron State College (CSC), Community Mental Health, planning on counseling all age groups with a special interest in youth counseling.

High School recipients: Natalie Gasseling, Hemingford, Wayne State College, Physician Assistant; Sophia Sanchez, University of Nebraska-Kearney (UNK), KHOP Program, Physician (and indicates she wants to come back and serve the community); Carli Cullan, Hemingford, University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL), Occupational Therapy; Trevor Ridenour, CSC, Pre-nursing, BSN RN; Ashley Agler, Hay Springs, Bryan College of Health Sciences, Diagnostic Medical in Sonography; Kami Felker, CSC, Pre-Nursing, interested in OB nursing; Jada Stinson, CSC, Pre-Nursing, interested in becoming a pediatric oncology nurse; Josie Mantooth, CSC, Radiology Technician; Hannah Korte, CSC, Radiology Technician, Ultrasound and x-Ray (wants to come back to work at BBGH); and Gage Rolls, CSC, undecided, but leaning toward business side of healthcare.

The other main business of the evening was a Strategic Plan presentation by a core team made up of BBGH staff who have been developing plans focused on five strategic initiatives. Core team members include: CEO Lori Mazanec, CNO Carolyn Jones, CQO Mary Mockerman, CFO, Emirates Tracy Jatczak, CFO Bridger Miller, COO Jim Bargen, Clinic Manager Joni Sauttter, Laboratory Manager Gail Burke, OR Manager Kaitlyn Stabnow, Co-Rehab Managers Tim Devlin and Brandon Kiser, and Marketing Department’s Kristi Ellstrom.

The five strategic initiatives and the plans to implement them include:

Initiative #1: Identify partnership opportunities to support physician/provider recruitment and retention. Objectives & Goals: To establish and enhance Medical Provider-Hospital partnerships through 1) Satisfied medical providers in Box Butte County; 2) Expanded services through specialist offerings (telemedicine, specialty services, satellite hospitals); 3) Retained relationships with students, internships, medical residency programs. To obtain those goals, the team focused on these strategies: Recruitment, retention, succession planning, and partnership opportunities. Each strategy had several proposals on how to move forward to achieve the goals of each strategy.

Initiative #2: Strengthen quality and service excellence to enhance the patient experience. Four goals were identified to improve and enhance the team patient experience. Goal #1: Identify and respond to patients’ treatment goals, fears and concerns at every point of care. Goal #2: Implement systems and tools to determine patient’s readiness to learn. Goal #3: Improve medication reconciliation process. Goal #4: Develop and implement systems to prevent hospital acquired conditions. Again, each goal has proposals on how to achieve the objectives outlined in the team/patient experience.

Initiative #3: Develop plans to capture market share and reduce outmigration through mutually beneficial collaboration with other healthcare organizations. The team identified five strategies to achieve the initiative’s goal: 1) Find what services BBGH is losing based on manager feedback and NHA reporting; 2) Educate community on services we offer with a marketing plan; 3) Increase telemedicine services; 4) Find what services BBGH is losing based on feedback from community providers; 5) Measure effectiveness through survey responses, service increase, and marketing statistics.

Initiative #4: Work with staff to improve physician engagement. Goal: To create a definition of engagement; enhance the perception of physician engagement for staff, medical providers, and community patrons. To obtain the goal the team defined what areas need to be addressed, including medical staff, hospital staff, peer to peer, and the community by using surveys, involving QHR, engagement difference, physician leadership opportunities, and staff involvement.

Initiative #5: Develop strategies to improve employee morale and redefine perceptions regarding employee turnover. Three goals were identified by the team: 1) Management training; 2) Good outcomes; 3) Employee incentives. Each goal had several strategies outlined to achieve  each objective.

After input and questions from the Trustees, it was decided that progress on one or more of the initiatives would be reported to the board each fiscal quarter.

The board also conducted the following business:

Jen Foster, PTA, was recognized by the board for being named the May 2017 Employee of the Month.  New employees were welcomed to the BBGH family: GayLynn Holthus, RN, Clinical Informatics; Samantha Hudson, Radiology Tech; and Eric Enyeart, Maintenance Tech.

After approving the consent calendar the Trustees heard a request from the Master Trainers for Team Strategy and Tools to Enhance Performance and Patient Safety (TeamSTEPPS) to proclaim May as TeamSTEPPS Month. The board unanimously approved the request (see photo).

Ms. Mockerman presented her monthly Quality Management and Safety report, focusing on the most recent core measurements, as well as the hospital’s participation in a state wide exercise alert that she described as valuable in lessons learned.

BBGH Chief of Staff Dr. Tim Narjes commented that he appreciated the steps being taken and planning being made by the hospital to handle medical contingencies that may occur during the upcoming total eclipse event coming in August.

Patient Experience Ambassador Dede DeVeny had the Trustees perform an exercise that highlighted the hospital’s focus on trust and compassion to the patients it serves. She had the people attending the meeting write down a secret that no one else knew about them; one they really wouldn’t like anyone to know, then fold it in front of them. She said she knew that probably caused some anxiety and a hope that the secret wouldn’t be shared during the exercise. “That is what our patients experience when they come to see their physician, or are being treated at our hospital,” she said. “Illness is a very private thing, and our culture here focuses on compassion, a compassion that treats everyone the same and respects their privacy. Now, you can throw away your little secrets.”

The Trustees tabled a decision on revised loan documents for the Line of Credit from Sandhills State Bank, as a representative from the bank was not able to attend to answer questions.

Ms. Miller requested that a date be set for a budget workshop in June, prior to the regular meeting at the end of the month. The Trustees set Tuesday, June 20, at 11:30am as the date and time.

After unanimously approving all credentialing requests, the Trustees entered executive session at 8:23pm  to discuss patient advocate and quality management matters. They re-entered open session and adjourned at 9:15pm with no action taken.

The next board meeting will be held Monday, June 26 at 7:00pm in the BBGH Alliance Room. As always, the public is invited to attend.

Box Butte General Hospital is an equal opportunity provider and employer.