Collaborative Practice in an Urban Medical Center

  Collaborative Practice in an Urban Medical Center
Abstract:  Collaborative practice brings together health care professionals with different and complimentary knowledge and skills to improve the effectiveness of caregivers and promote patient safety. While the concept is well-recognized inculcating the principles of collaboration remains a challenge in healthcare environments.
Leadership in the Washington Hospital Center’s Women’s and Infants’ Services Division has systematically embraced collaboration as a primary value for operational management and patient care delivery. Having embarked on a formal Perinatal Patient Safety Program collaboration has become a shared value.
Patient safety can not occur in silos. Without conscientious effort to integrate care, secularism and hierarchy present roadblocks to communication and teamwork. At all levels collaborative practice is not just a byword but a core value.
To enhance collaboration educational efforts are shared. Nurses are encouraged to participate in High Risk Conference and Grand Rounds. Interns and nursing fellows receive the same Electronic Fetal Monitoring introductory course presented by nurse educators. A nurse/physician team presents an advanced EFM course to a joint audience of nurses and doctors.
Committees, councils, and work groups include open membership opportunities for all employees and providers. An OB/Anesthesia/Labor & Delivery task force discusses common concerns shared by obstetricians, anesthesiologists, scrub technicians and all team members involved in surgical care. Patient safety committee membership also includes unit clerks, equipment technicians, pharmacy, social work, sonographers and any other staff member involved directly or indirectly in patient care. While nursing representatives have sat as contributing members to the medical peer review committee, a recent change incorporates nursing within the same peer review process. Actions of the peer review committee follow the same guidelines for all nurses and providers.
Critical event team training is a recent addition to our team concept. From environmental services to attending physicians we share a common goal. The safety and well-being of our patients drives an on-going effort to look to every member of the team for participation in efforts to improve the quality of care.