In honor of National Patient Safety Awareness week Cortland Regional Medical
Center (CRMC) is proud to recognize 49 staff who recently completed the
23.5 credit hour Institute for Healthcare Improvement Patient Safety,
Quality and Patient-Centered Care curriculum. IHI provides universities,
organizations and health systems around the world with essential training
and tools to deliver, maintain, and improve safety, leadership, and quality
within their organizations.
As a local healthcare leader, Cortland Regional is committed to continual
improvement of the overall patient experience. This level of participation
by our senior management, department management, and educators reflects
the dedication and commitment of our staff to not only meet safety and
quality expectations, but to surpass them. “Participation from managers
from all types of departments solidifies the message that keeping patients
safe and delivering high quality care is everyone's job,” says
Joan Skawski, Director of Quality and Risk Management.
In high consequence fields like health care, errors can be more than inconvenient;
they can be life altering or deadly. For example, medication errors are
among the most common patient harm events to occur in hospitals. Last
year CRMC worked diligently to improve this error-prone process via simplification,
education and process revisions, says CEO Mark Webster. “The great
news is that we’re even safer today than we were when we received
such high marks from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid last year.”
“A great patient experience is dependent on high quality and safe
patient care," says Patient Experience Officer Toni Murdough. "
Completing the IHI Quality and Safety courses alongside our managers and
senior leadership gave us both camaraderie and a common mission. The real-life
examples we explored through the courses validated that we do indeed provide
great care. It also gave us new tools and strategies to use on our journey
from good to great.”