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Currents To Medical Center Employees: Medical Centerwide goals for Fiscal Year 2005-2006 will, in most cases, be a continuation of ongoing initiatives. Our overarching goal will be to continue to fulfill our mission by providing high quality compassionate care and excellent customer service.   We are off to a great start with the Phase I hospital facility construction project. Our goal is to keep construction on or ahead of the January 2008 contract completion target date. We will develop a plan for an orderly move into the new facility and for “backfill” of vacated space. We also plan to complete construction of PCICU and the new PT/OT in the new Ashley-Rutledge Parking Garage, and open an additional adult CATH/EP lab on the 9th floor.   Our financial goals include sustaining our momentum to meet financial targets.  Our tactical plan calls for achievement of a 4 percent financial margin for the new fiscal year.    To “hardwire service excellence” we plan to begin development and implementation of improved operational policies and procedures aligned with patient satisfaction, staff satisfaction, financial performance, new hire selection and expectations, and recognition and reward. We will enhance leadership development and accountability and continue involvement of work groups to focus on service excellence.    We will continue our work toward implementation of the advanced point-of-care information system. Training and revision of policies to ensure JCAHO survey readiness will remain a key initiative and efforts to increase scores for the mandated CMS quality indicators will continue.    The above highlights a number of substantive goals that will affect all Medical Center employees in some fashion. I ask that everyone keep the Medical Centerwide goals in mind as you develop your departmental plans for the new fiscal year. The new fiscal year promises to be challenging and exciting. W. Stuart Smith Vice President for Clinical Operations and Executive Director, MUSC Medical Center Performance evaluation modifications made Eric Frisch, employee relations manager, and Pat Aysse, surgical services program manager, presented the revised position description/performance evaluation tool. These current changes are applicable to the non-management tool. The management version is forthcoming.   The changes include: Removed the requirement for a reviewer’s signature for the planning stage. It remains a requirement for the evaluation section. Removed the degree of supervision and supervisory responsibilities along with the signatures that were used to obtain “job posting authorization.” The physical demands for all job classifications have been revised The “job purpose” must be unique to the respective unit and position. Generic job purpose statements are not acceptable. Performance Characteristics/Behavioral Expectations section was modified to clearly define the success criteria. The term “age specific” and “patient specific” has been replaced with “population specific. Overall summary and improvement plan was moved so it comes before the final rating section. Summary of accomplishments, to identify the employee’s major accomplishments during the evaluation period. Goals and performance plan, to identify goals, areas needing improvement, a plan for that improvement and a professional development plan if appropriate. Percentage weights of the categories have been modified to reflect the increased focus on customer service and behavior expectations of the organization. The current task score will decrease from 70 percent to 50 percent, customer service score will increase from 20 percent to 25 percent and the performance characteristics score will increase from 10 percent to 25 percent. The implementation of the plan will occur over a one-year period beginning Aug. 1. Current planning stages are to be used until the time of an employee’s evaluation is completed and administered. A manager is to use the new document for the planning stage for the next review period. Leapfrog Group Rosemary Ellis, Quality and Patient Safety director, announced MUSC participation in The Leapfrog Group organization. The Leapfrog Group is made up of more than 170 companies and organizations that buy health care. Its members work together to: Reduce preventable medical mistakes and improve the quality and affordability of health care. Encourage public reporting of health care quality and outcomes so that consumers and purchasing organizations can make more informed health care choices. Click here for our latest hospital quality ratings. Reward doctors and hospitals for improving the quality, safety and affordability of health care. Help consumers reap the benefits of making smart health care decisions. “The group’s mission is to trigger a giant leap forward in the safety, quality and affordability of health care by supporting informed health care decisions by those who use and pay for health care, and promote high-value health care through incentives and rewards.   A performance comparison of hospitals in the Lowcountry area can be viewed at the Web site: http://www.leapfroggroup.org/home and clicking on “latest hospital quality ratings.” Tactical Plan Update—Provider of Choice Chris Murray, director of Business Development and Marketing Services, gave a Provider of Choice presentation from the Internal Awareness Committee. The committee’s charge: Identify the strengths and achievements that differentiate the Medical Center. Develop an internal communication campaign to raise employee awareness of the strengths and achievements. Create a plan for developing Medical Center employees into effective, positive community ambassadors to potential patients, referrers and employees. Murray said that the committee has developed a survey tool to identify “pride points” for clinical foci and centers and has identified those pride points through a centers/departments/administration survey.   She said the committee’s internal communication plan began with a survey of other institutions regarding infrastructure and success with internal communications and has identified new internal distribution channels to include shuttle bus external signage, internal message boards, kiosks, elevator communications, and on-hold messaging.   The committee is also developing a template PowerPoint presentation that could highlight MUSC pride points for presentations to internal and external audiences by service line areas. The committee is working with the internal communications committee to ensure their recommendations are considered when developing messages and it is developing a budget for internal communications via new channels of distribution.   To create a plan for developing Medical Center employees into effective, positive community ambassadors to potential patients, referrers and employees, the committee has found that the foundation of employee pride begins with employees feeling valued by the organization. The committee conducted employee focus groups to determine what types of recognition are meaningful to employees and forwarded the results to the employee retention committee. The recommendations include: Assess effectiveness of the applause program and formalize a proposal for enhancements for administration. Create higher visibility of administration throughout the organization. Support programs like MUSC Families First where employees are the focus of efforts. Improve communication of value added benefits to MUSC employees. Tactical Plan Update—Reduce Costs The members of MUHA's leadership enjoyed a small celebration of success at Tuesday’s communication meeting for achieving the targeted goal for reducing costs and improving financial performance as outlined by the Tactical Plan. Vicki Marsi, financial affairs vice chairman, Obstetrics and Gynecology, announced that the fiscal year end margin was 3.8 percent over expenses which represents $24.7 million dollars and surpassed the goal of 3.5 percent.    “This achievement is important in the overall support for building the new hospital and represents tremendous contributions by the entire MUHA community,” Marsi said.  “Congratulations to everyone, and thank you for the continued efforts to improve overall performance.” Action O-I Pamela Marek, decision support analyst, announced that it is once again time to submit Action O-I data, this time for the quarter ending June 30. The data is due to be in the system by Aug. 20. Also, each area is asked to verify their Characteristic Survey Questions.   “I have scheduled the training room for any additional needs during the submittal period,” Marek said, “for anyone who needs a data entry refresher or would like to continue creating reports from Action O-I data.   Action O-I classes will be held in room 220 of the Clinical Science Building for Data Collection and Reporting. Classes begin on the hour and the half hour on Aug. 2 from 2 p.m. until 5 and on Aug. 12 from 8 a.m. until 1. Computer System Down Time     Main Hospital (all computer access affected) beginning at midnight Saturday, July 30. This outage is part of a OCIO-IS campus-wide network upgrade to the core computer network. As part of this effort, at midnight, the primary network switches in MUH 369 and CH115 will be replaced. Downtime ends at 2 a.m. The only buildings affected are the Children’s Hospital and main hospital and all network communications to and from these buildings. For information, call Michael Haschker, information services network systems, at 792-8314 or haschker@musc.edu. Introduction Meridith Lyons-Crews, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry, was introduced last week as the newly appointed manager for Youth Partial Hospitalization Programs. She has worked in the department’s youth programs for more than 10 years.     Friday, July 29, 2005 Catalyst Online is published weekly, updated as needed and improved from time to time by the MUSC Office of Public Relations for the faculty, employees and students of the Medical University of South Carolina. Catalyst Online editor, Kim Draughn, can be reached at 792-4107 or by email, catalyst@musc.edu. Editorial copy can be submitted to Catalyst Online and to The Catalyst in print by fax, 792-6723, or by email to petersnd@musc.edu or catalyst@musc.edu. To place an ad in The Catalyst hardcopy, call Community Press at 849-1778.