Hi everyone,
Last year, University Health Network introduced our first Balanced Scorecard (BSC) as a tool for focusing on organization-wide priorities and measuring our progress. Using the scorecard, we could see that by the second quarter (April - September 2006) we reduced our surgical cancellation rate; lowered the incidence of pressure ulcers in elderly patients; and continued facing challenges with tackling emergency room overcrowding and patient flow. We will soon release our third quarter results (October - December 2006) highlighting our progress for that period. To plan for the 07/08 BSC, we heard feedback on ways of refining our approach and scorecard to make it more meaningful and relevant to the work you do. One of the important changes is to make our quarterly results more timely so you have the latest information on our progress. We are also developing new tools to support managers with communicating and using the BSC with staff. Finally, we are improving how we present the scorecard so that the information is easier to read and understand.
07/08 Balanced Scorecard
To measure our success with the Balanced Scorecard, we've identified four critical success factors which were highlighted in an earlier "Straight Talk". On behalf of Kevin Empey and Catherine Zahn, I'm pleased to share this year's Balanced Scorecard. A few highlights:
We - As a Canadian "Top Employer" UHN is committed to supporting staff and making our hospitals rewarding places to learn, teach and work. This year, we will focus on increasing staff engagement, reducing voluntary turnover, enhancing leadership opportunities, and ensuring adequate/appropriate staffing. To support these objectives, you will hear more about UHN's new Code of Workplace Ethics, clinical manager succession planning, and a wellness and occupational health strategy, among other initiatives supporting staff.
Caring - We believe that our patients should have confidence that they're getting the safest health care at our hospitals. This year's "Caring" domain features a number of objectives and initiatives to set the bar higher in patient safety. Eliminating hospital-acquired infections (such as MRSA), reducing the incidences of pressure ulcers, as well as reducing severe and critical medication error incidents are some of the objectives we've set for ourselves. We will also strive to improve the patient experience at UHN by reducing the amount of time waiting when admitted in the emergency departments, reducing OR cancellations and improving patient satisfaction.
Creative - We are a research hospital. For 07/08, we will concentrate on increasing research commercialization and translating research into clinical practice.
Accountable - In this domain, we will continue to emphasize our accountability to our patients, the government and our health care partners. For example, we will work on sustaining improvements in chart and OR note completion so that timely information is captured. We will continue to ensure that we are fiscally accountable and that we accomplish the clinical volumes assigned to us as wait time targets.
Academic - For 07/08, we will focus on offering more continuing education activities; improving how we measure student satisfaction with UHN's training; and increasing staff knowledge and understanding of inter-professional practice.
Maintaining Momentum
As you can see, the 07/08 BSC includes some ongoing initiatives, most notably our five clinical operational priorities: ED-GIM, OR Transformation, Palliative Care, the I³ initiative in the Peter Munk Cardiac Centre and Image-Guided Surgery (GTx) projects. These projects are major initiatives to transform the way we deliver care at UHN. We're committed to seeing these initiatives through to completion so look out for more news about their progress.
Look out for news about this year's scorecard, the teams behind our initiatives and of course our progress. I encourage everyone to review the BSC, which is available on the intranet.
Bob
