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No part of this informative article might be reproduced without the express created permission through the copyright holder. Patient satisfaction produced simple: foundations Recovery Network finds that therapy patients find the straightforward things--relationships, rely on and enjoyable.
Some many years back, on his appointment as CEO (one) (Chief Executive Officer) The best individual in command of an corporation. Typically the president from the company, the CEO reviews for the Chairman with the Board. of a psychiatric hospital psychiatric hospital
n.
A hospital for the care and treatment of individuals affected with acute or chronic mental illness. Also called mental hospital. , Rob Waggener's first act of leadership was to get himself admitted for a week. He wanted to understand the individual experience.
So, in 2008, when Foundations Recovery Network (FRN FRN
See: Floating-rate note , Nashville, Tenn.) committed to improving "customer experience management" as a means of improving satisfaction, outcomes, revenues, and referrals, it was no surprise that Waggener, who now serves as FRN's CEO, was on board.
This time, however,Tiffany Key, research was conducted by a college-age intern intern /in·tern/ (in´tern) a medical graduate serving in a hospital preparatory to being licensed to practice medicine.
in·tern or in·terne
n. who--as a affected individual at every FRN facility--completed what FRN executives now call "Ted's Excellent Adventure."
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Through eye-opening "moments of magic and misery" (see Figure 1), the intern captured the customer experience and convinced FRN execs that changes were needed. At the same time, execs studied the details of customer experience management as explained in Fred Lee's book, "If Disney ran your hospital."
FRN's leaders saw the value of improving the customer experience, says Waggener. At that point, "we moved from thinking about what individuals want to actually finding out."
The customer's view of therapy
Another driving force behind FRN's effort was to better address the motivation level of customers (sufferers) at the beginning of treatment method. Noting that FRN's treatment method approach utilizes the "five stages of change" model (SAMHSA SAMHSA Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration ,Pandora Bracelets, TIP 35), Waggener says few individuals arrive in the "action" phase. That, he says, "is the phase where they accept that they have a problem and are motivated to change." This phase is considered the key to effective, patient-driven treatment method.
Instead, he says that "the vast majority arrive in earlier phases--the 'precontemplation' or 'contemplation' phases--when they're just beginning to consider that they may have a problem. They're showing up because they want to get the family off their back."
To get the treatment process started, "we've got to meet them where they are and tap into the limited amount of motivation they've got," says Waggener. That means making the therapy experience as attractive as possible--from the first call to post-discharge follow-up--because "people who don't want to be in remedy will complain about everything. They just want out."
Research defines the challenge
To better tap into, then define, these powerful elements of customer expectation and experience, FRN leaders hired Diane Schmalensee--a former Malcolm Bald ridge Quality Award examiner--to outline FRN's quality-improvement effort, starting with research. Ultimately, the research encompassed some 30 "customer" focus groups including program alumni, current sufferers, families, and referral sources, as well as some 70 percent of FRN staff from every location.
The research also:
* identified five major phases from the treatment process (pre-admission, admission, clinical remedy, daily experiences, and pre- and post-discharge);
* identified the most significant or important expectations in each phase and how they are experienced, satisfied, or struggled with, by the clients;
* identified which FRN employee function(s) were involved in fulfilling the expectation; and
* suggested procedures that could be used to ensure expectation fulfillment.
Teams convert research to process
Next, FRN execs joined with facility directors and their staffs to develop cross-functional and cross-locational teams. These teams would compare the suggested procedures to actual (and varied) work processes at each location, then hammer out "ideal" work processes--customized to specific employee functions--so that each functional process could be standardized at each site.
The team process resulted in development of:
* a large "Policies and Procedures Policies and Procedures are a set of documents that describe an organization's policies for operation and the procedures necessary to fulfill the policies. They are often initiated because of some external requirement, such as environmental compliance or other governmental " manual containing the broad collection of internal processes;
* a series of small function-specific (physician, nurse, counselor, etc.) Process Manuals focused on delivery with the customer experience in each role, and;
* a series of customer/family/referral questionnaires that would be completed at intervals coming or happening with intervals between; now and then.
See also: Interval from admission through post-discharge to measure overall impacts on the customer experience relative to objectives.
Pilot testing
In the fall of 2009, the entire customer experience management process--renamed the "Patient Centered Care" initiative--was then piloted at FRN's The Canyon in Malibu, Calif.
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The 2009 pilot tests drove practical insights that were essential to further customizing site-specific materials and processes, simplifying the proposed online questionnaire process (ultimately,Discount Tiffany, paper forms proved simpler), standardizing affected individual forms across sites,Wholesale Pandora Bracelets, and sharpening For image sharpening, see .
Sharpening is the process of creating or refining a sharp edge on a tool or implement. The term has a wide application but could be expressed as the creation of two intersecting planes which produce an edge that is sharp enough to cut through the target the most valuable elements of staff training.
Program rollout and results
After these improvements, the entire PCC initiative was rolled out, starting with staff-wide training, in April 2010. A "before" and "after" comparison, based on year-over-year results, shows the positive trends (Figure one).
Program metric Before PCC After PCC (April-October 2009) (April-October 2010) Affected individual satisfaction 3.8 4.2 (1-5 scale) Willingness to recommend [left arrow] [up arrow] (trend) [right arrow] Average length of stay 29.4 31.one (days) Average daily census [down arrow] [up arrow] (trend) Staff turnover (percent) 4.0 2.8 Figure 1: Before and after PCC initiative.
Critical towards the program's success were the Process Manuals, which succinctly suc·cinct  
adj. suc·cinct·er, suc·cinct·est
1. Characterized by clear, precise expression in few words; concise and terse: a succinct reply; a succinct style.
2. blend customer-satisfaction goals for each phase with the program with role-specific employee process steps, insights to customer expectations during that phase, and examples of what Waggener calls "the look, the sound, the feel" needed to create a satisfying customer experience.
The manuals themselves are just a few pages, "not crazy long," says Waggener, but they're powerful.
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Waggener says that "happy patients stay longer," a phenomenon that drives revenue by increasing recommendations and referrals, increasing average length of stay, and increasing average daily census daily census See Census. . While those findings are no surprise, what FRN didn't expect was the impact on staff. Turnover is down and the staff feels empowered. "They love it," says Waggener.
Another surprise was found in what FRN calls the "drivers" of patient satisfaction. "As clinicians, we always like to think that our impact, our clinical interventions are always what makes the difference," says Waggener. He adds that such thinking leads remedy center executives to think that costly new treatment modalities Modalities
The factors and circumstances that cause a patient's symptoms to improve or worsen, including weather, time of day, effects of food,Tiffany Diamonds, and similar factors. are critical to success.
"Yet, we found that what matters most to people, next to consistent and fair handling of program rules, is 'What do you do for sober fun?' That was one with the biggest drivers of satisfaction each week in remedy, something that they remember and carry with them. And, it really doesn't cost anything!"
RELATED Report: SPECIAL SECTION
James W. West, MD, Quality Improvement Awards
By Dennis Grantham,Tiffany Blue, Editor-in-Chief
Established in 2001, the James W. West, MD, Quality Improvement Awards recognize NAATP-member addiction remedy organizations that improve the quality and effectiveness of their services and document their results along the way.
The award is named in honor of James W. West, a longtime quality-improvement advocate and medical director emeritus e·mer·i·tus  
adj.
Retired but retaining an honorary title corresponding to that held immediately before retirement: a professor emeritus.
n. pl. at the Betty Ford Center. The 2011 award recipients will be honored at the National Association of Addiction Therapy Providers' (NAATP NAATP National Association of Addiction Therapy Providers
NAATP North American Association of Technology Professionals
NAATP National Association for the Advancement of Tall People (humor) ) annual conference, held May 14-17 in Phoenix.
This, the 11th annual award, recognizes two programs whose efforts demonstrate comprehensive approaches to quality improvement. Foundations Recovery Network (Nashville, Tenn.) is recognized for its Patient Centered Care initiative, while Memorial Hermann PaRC (Prevention and Recovery Center, Houston, Tex.) is recognized for a body of work comprised of four quality improvement efforts. Congratulations!
Article Details Printer friendly Cite/link Email Feedback Publication:Behavioral Healthcare Date:Apr one, 2011 Words:1155Previous Write-up:A conversation with Andy Eckert: in his first interview, CRC Health Group's new CEO looks forward to his work with the nation's largest addiction...Next Post:Quality: it's all in the details: Memorial-Hermann PaRC's quality culture sustains four patient-safety projects.
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