Hi Team  –

 

Last week marked the official start of fall, and we kicked off the season here at TriHealth with our September Town Hall, which took place last Wednesday. I hope you were able to join us to learn first-hand about our fast start to FY2023 and the encouraging progress we are making with our Pillar Goals. A special thanks to all those who joined in the conversation, and congratulations to the 20 lucky team members who won cool TriHealth prizes for participating in the discussion!

 

A vital component of our work to get healthcare right is proactively addressing health disparities by improving access to care and removing barriers for our patients to maintain good health. So, I’m thrilled to share that last week, we took another important step forward in this effort with the ribbon-cutting ceremony and grand opening of TriHealth’s first-ever “self-selection” free food pantry located at Good Samaritan Hospital. 

 

Developed in partnership with the Freestore Foodbank and the Bob Edwards Feed A Child Fund, this pantry will serve our patients seen in the Good Sam Faculty Medical Center (FMC). Now, when our FMC physicians are treating patients experiencing food insecurity, they can simply walk those patients across the hall to the food pantry where they are able to self-select what they need for their family from a wide variety of shelved, refrigerated and frozen food.

 

The FMC Food Pantry also serves as a shining example of how our individual and organizational contributions to the One Campaign and United Way make a real difference in the lives of those we serve.

 

At its core, Getting Healthcare Right is about delivering the right care in the right place at the right time to produce the right clinical outcomes at the right cost. That is how we achieve the Triple Aim of better care, better health and better value. However, the Triple Aim is not simply about doing the right thing, it’s also about making sure we do things in the right WAY. 

 

Two long years of COVID, coupled with growing community demand for our TriHealth services, have exposed underlying inefficiencies, a lack of coordination, and bottlenecks in our throughput processes and care models. So, in August, we announced an evidence-based, multidisciplinary team initiative aimed at dramatically improving two key areas – throughput in our hospitals and Emergency Departments and clinical care redesign. The first phase of this initiative was focused on the discovery and validation of the improvement opportunities to provide us with a deeper understanding of TriHealth’s current state, in terms of operational, cultural, and financial performance. During this phase we:

From the feedback received, three major themes were loud and clear.

 

First, we heard that continuing to cultivate a positive and collaborative work environment with the tools and processes in place to support meaningful communication and care coordination is a critical component for improving quality of care, patient and caregiver experience, and clinical outcomes.

 

We also heard from respondents that healthcare is much more than a career, it is a calling. TriHealth team members come to work each day with the desire to make a positive impact – whether it be providing direct patient care, delivering equipment, transporting patients, sterilizing supplies, or even managing budgets. However, when team members are understaffed, overburdened, or feeling the pressure, it’s difficult for them to derive satisfaction and reward from their work. So, it’s vital that we address the underlying workplace stressors to enable team members to more consistently feel a sense of joy, fulfillment, and pride in the work they’re doing. 

 

Finally, we heard that the necessary changes made during COVID to ensure TriHealth remained open to serve our community with no patient ever being turned away, exposed and magnified some of our system’s longstanding weaknesses. So now we must take these “lessons learned” to reimagine and transform how we deliver care for the better in more innovative ways that are aligned with today’s new and more challenging realities and changing consumer expectations.

 

This feedback will now be used to guide the next phase of our work – the design phase – which is aimed at creating solutions to address the key improvement opportunities identified. We will do this through a series of workshops involving design teams of frontline team members, physicians, and leaders, with the goal of creating solutions to enable TriHealth to not simply survive, but thrive now and well into the future. The design phase will run through early November, and we will share regular updates on progress and improved outcomes.

 

With the start of fall also comes the start of flu season. And, now that COVID restrictions are largely lifted in most parts of the world, including universal mask-wearing, early indicators from the southern hemisphere (where winter is just ending) are pointing to a more severe flu season here in North America. 

 

As has been our practice – and a CDC/Centers for Medicare and Medicaid requirement for nearly ten years – the flu vaccine will again be required for all TriHealth team members, physicians, and volunteers, unless a medical or religious exemption is requested and approved. This is one of the most effective ways we can protect our patients and each other from the unnecessary spread of the flu and its often serious, and even deadly, effects. This vital preventive measure is more important than ever, as we are now also contending with the lingering COVID transmission.

 

Yesterday, we launched our annual flu shot campaign, which makes it fast, easy, and convenient for you to get vaccinated. You can receive your free flu shot in multiple ways: at any of our five TriHealth Employee Health flu shot clinics (Bethesda North Outpatient Imaging, Good Samaritan Hospital, TriHealth Norwood, Bethesda Butler, and McCullough-Hyde Memorial Hospital), your physician's office, or from another community vendor. And beginning Monday, October 3, you can also get the new COVID bivalent booster at three of our Employee Health flu clinics (Good Samaritan Hospital, Bethesda North Outpatient Imaging, and McCullough-Hyde Memorial Hospital). The new bivalent vaccine is highly effective since it is specially constituted to target both the original COVID coronavirus, as well as new omicron variants. Visit Bridge for full details on how to sign up for your shots today!

 

We know that successfully managing our own “financial health” by growing and making the best use of our retirement dollars is essential to our overall health, wellbeing, and peace of mind. TriHealth’s Total Rewards package, which includes our TriHealth Retirement Program, likely plays an important role in helping you build this financial security, both now and well into the future. 

 

As you may recall, the TriHealth Retirement Plan and the Good Samaritan Hospital Retirement Plan (“pension plans”), which are a part of the TriHealth Retirement Program, were frozen at the end of 2014, and no new benefits have been earned since then. At the time the pension plans were frozen, TriHealth shifted its investment in team member retirement benefits by enhancing the current 401(k) retirement plan.

 

Since freezing the pension plans, the assets in the plans have grown such that today they are fully funded, so TriHealth has decided to close and transfer the pension plans. This will allow us to transfer the day-to-day administration of the pension benefit to an insurance company whose core competencies – unlike TriHealth’s – are the operation, management, and payment of pension benefits. Impacted team members are those who began employment with TriHealth before December 31, 2014, and who are vested in the pension plans. These impacted team members will NOT lose any of the benefit they have earned under their pension plan in this process. In fact, by closing the pension plans, TriHealth is giving impacted team members more control of their benefit by providing a special distribution opportunity, which offers the flexibility to reconsider and adjust their current retirement strategy. This opportunity offers three pension benefit distribution options: 1) receive a one-time lump sum payout with the ability to roll it over to an eligible retirement account or qualified plan, offering more control over their investment choices; 2) begin monthly annuity payments; or 3) wait to take their pension benefit until they are eligible under the terms of our existing pension plan rule. It’s important to emphasize that this decision does NOT, in any way, change or affect the TriHealth 401(k) plan, in which most team members participate.

 

Impacted team members will receive an email later today with more information about this change, along with a link to attend a special town hall this Friday, September 30, 2022, from 12-1pm to learn more about this change and get their questions answered. Additionally, more information will be provided in a letter and FAQ mailed to the homes of impacted team members during the week of October 3. 

 

COVID transmission rates in the region and here at TriHealth continue to decline, with 10 counties now at “low” risk levels, and a regional transmission rate of 146/100,000 population (see sidebar COVID graphic for latest statistics).

 

Thank you for all you do to help us fulfill our mission of improving the health status of the people we serve!