Good Monday morning,
1. Highlights on UHN's Essentials
UHN's Essentials are the things essential to our work at UHN – hence the name! They represent our central responsibilities as a leading academic health sciences centre.
Read here to learn about them all. Below, you'll find our highlights on UHN's Essentials from last week.
Operational Excellence Keeping wait times low despite a high volume of patients: Let's give a round of applause to the blood collection lab team at our Princess Margaret site for serving more than 600 patients one day (with one staff member short!) while keeping wait times below 20 minutes. Special thanks to Guitree Sukhdeo, Senior Technician at UHN's Laboratory Medicine Program, who played an important role in making this happen – she emphasizes that this was made possible thanks to the whole blood collection team. To improve flow and ensure a quality patient experience that day, everyone agreed to take their breaks one at a time instead of their usual times, which helped immensely. Many thanks to all involved for your impressive teamwork.
Quality and Safety Managing an unusually high number of influenza and RSV (respiratory syncytial virus) outbreaks: I'll start with what we all know –
prevention is key to keeping these viruses out of our units. This season, we're experiencing more outbreaks than our peer hospitals in the GTA. Please remind each other to practice excellent hand hygiene, use personal protective equipment, get your flu shot if you haven't and do not come to work when sick. On the last point, we know that sick days impact staffing and the delivery of care – but we can't have people coming in sick and contributing to outbreaks (while having a poor work experience that day no doubt!) – so we must remember to help each other and share resources as one TeamUHN. Thank you all for your continued diligence, dedication and perseverance.
Quality and Safety Staff injuries: Last week, several staff injuries were raised up to our Network and Executive-level huddles, including cut hands, back injuries and slips. We know that safety is important to not only patients but also TeamUHN! Please ensure you’re up to date with workplace safety practices and look at the resources you can use here on our Caring Safely page
[Editor's Note: Link is no longer available].
2. Welcoming the residents of tomorrow
This month, we have medical students starting their CaRMS (Canadian Resident Matching Service) residency program interviews for the University of Toronto at UHN. You may be able to spot these future residents with their
distinctive purple backpacks paired with their finest business attire! Good time to remember that we should welcome all who come through UHN, not just patients and familiar colleagues. I know we do a great job of helping people who look lost navigating our buildings, let's keep those positive first impressions up and become the healthcare employer of choice!
3. Join me at Breakfast with the Chiefs on Wednesday
This Wednesday at 8 a.m., I'll be discussing how we can improve quality and safety in an overburdened health system at Breakfast with the Chiefs, an educational series run by Longwoods to discuss best practices and new ideas. You are all welcome to join and register here
[Editor's Note: Link is no longer available]. When you visit the Longwoods site, you'll be automatically logged in as "University Health Network." To successfully register for this event, you'll have to log out and create your own free account first using your UHN email address.
Have a good week,
Kevin
