April 11, 2023
Hi Team –
Greetings from the Northern Kentucky Convention Center where I’m joined today and tomorrow by our 800+ TriHealth Leaders for our Annual Safety Summit and 25th Leadership Development Institute (LDI)! We’re excited for this opportunity to connect, learn, and grow together – all so we can become even better, more accountable servant leaders for YOU, our 13,000 team members and physicians!!
Your leaders will be in touch soon after the LDI to share what they learned and how they will be actively assisting you in our work to further master our foundational TriHealth Way of Serving, Delivering Care and Safety and Reliability best practices – ultimately, so we can consistently deliver exceptional care and clinical outcomes, always! Thank you for supporting your leaders, once again, as we take this necessary time away from our daily responsibilities to participate in this important LDI and Safety Summit. Doing so will equip us as leaders to do even more to help you thrive as we continue on our journey to Zero Patient Harm and work together to Get Healthcare Right for all those we serve and those who serve!
Getting Healthcare Right
Big Wins for the TriHealth Heart Program
As part of our bold vision to Get Healthcare Right, TriHealth and our Heart & Vascular Institute (THVI) have been hard at work since 2018 to “get cardiac care right” by becoming the region’s largest and best provider of cardiovascular care for our patients and the community. And the impressive transformation of our cardiac program – marked by creation of the TriHealth Heart Hospital, development of regional centers of excellence and our one-of-a-kind partnership with the Cleveland Clinic – is powerful evidence of our remarkable progress on this journey. As more evidence of TriHealth’s growing regional and national leadership in getting cardiac care right, I’m pleased to share a few of our latest wins and milestones...
Last summer, TriHealth became the first healthcare system in Cincinnati to bring advanced 3D modeling technology to the diagnosis of coronary artery disease, utilizing the high-tech HeartFlow Analysis Artificial Intelligence (AI). And over the past eight months, TriHealth has made impressive progress in growing our coronary computed tomography angiography (CCTA) program and serving even more patients, thanks to the highly collaborative efforts of our exceptional cardiologists, radiologists, CT technologists, and cardiac nurses and their mastery of the HeartFlow AI technology. So, it’s not surprising that earlier this month, TriHealth and the Thomas Comprehensive Care Center became the first HeartFlow site in the Cincinnati Tri-State area to receive a CT Quality Award!! To be recognized with this award, a system must perform at least 50 CCTAs per quarter and perform in the top 20% in CT Quality across all 600 HeartFlow sites in the U.S. Not only did TriHealth exceed this top 20% quality ranking, but we completed 120 CCTAs in Q4 of 2022 – more than double the volume criteria!!!
Additionally, our Bethesda Cardiac Catheterization Lab team, led by Drs. William Martin, Jonathan Hassel and Najamul Ansari, recently completed our System’s 100th Chronic Total Occlusion (CTO) case. CTO is a very serious condition in which a coronary artery is 100% occluded or restricted for at least 90 days, leading to chest pain, fatigue, and shortness of breath, and an elevated risk of death. CTO cases can be long and complex in nature, requiring highly skilled interventional cardiologists to open the artery and re-establish blood flow. Achieving this 100-case milestone places our program in the top ten percent of all CTO programs in the nation!!
A BIG thank you and congratulations to all of our TriHealth clinicians and team members whose unwavering commitment to innovation and excellence in cardiac care has made these incredible achievements possible!!
bi3 Awards Fernside $1.3M Grant to Improve Health and Wellbeing of Children and Families
A vital part of Getting Healthcare Right is providing all those we serve with convenient and affordable access to the right care for every state of health – physically, mentally, and emotionally. As yet another example of this commitment, I’m pleased to share that bi3 – the philanthropic funding arm of our sponsor Bethesda, Inc. – has awarded a $1.3 million grant to the Fernside Center for Grieving Children. Left untreated, grief can lead to adverse, long-term effects on a child’s mental and emotional wellbeing and can contribute to depression and even self-destructive behaviors. This three-year grant will fund additional staffing to expand bereavement services – including support groups and crisis programs – to more schools and families. The grant will also provide seed funding for a new endowment to support the long-term growth of the organization. Fernside was established in 1986 to support and respond to the very real needs of grieving children, and is part of HOC Navigators, which is the extended care network of Hospice of Cincinnati. Today, Fernside is the nation’s second-oldest provider of childhood bereavement services and is consistently recognized as a national leader. Visit Bridge to learn more.
Diana Smith Appointed Vice President of Information Technology
As yet another shining example of the depth of talent throughout our system and our commitment to invest in and develop our own people, I am pleased to share that Diana Smith has been promoted to the role of Vice President of Information Technology (IT), replacing Donna Peters who was promoted to System Chief Information Officer (CIO). Diana will assume leadership responsibilities for TriHealth’s technology division, which includes system-wide technology operations, delivery and performance of technology solutions, and enterprise applications and infrastructure.
Over the past decade, Diana has been a model of our TriHealth Way of Leading and Serving, with a sharp focus on customer service and a passion for using IT to support and enhance both the patient care experience and the team member work experience. Since joining TriHealth in 2011, Diana has taken on roles of increasing responsibility, from IT Project Lead to her most recent role as Director of the Application Solution Center. Please join me in congratulating Diana on her well-deserved promotion and wishing her success in her new system role.
Mark Your Calendar: April Town Hall Livestream, Next Tuesday at Noon
You won’t want to miss our next monthly Team Member Town Hall livestreamed on Bridge on Tuesday, April 18 from 12-1pm. We plan to announce the winning Healthcare Heroes Week T-shirt design – as voted on and selected by you – and we will unveil our new TriHealth brand campaign! Nearly 11,000 team member votes were cast and T-shirt orders placed! During the Town Hall, we’ll also review the latest progress in our work to Get Healthcare Right, celebrate wins, and answer your questions – with some really cool TriHealth prizes, as always, for those who join the conversation! And there is still time to send along your thoughts and suggestions about the important topics, updates, and questions you’d like covered during the Town Hall. Simply email them to TownHall@trihealth.com today and we’ll be sure to include them in the discussion!
COVID Update
As you can see from the latest weekly COVID stats to the right, new COVID cases continue to trend downward across the region and in our hospitals and practices, more evidence that COVID has indeed evolved to a manageable endemic state. As shared last week, the federal government will end the three-year COVID public health emergency declaration on May 11 because of the marked reduction in transmission and risk of COVID. As a result, TriHealth is currently evaluating how best to evolve and/or roll back our COVID-related practices from masking to visitor policies to staffing and more. We’ll share details about these changes in the coming weeks, as decisions are finalized.
Because of YOU, our incredible team members and physicians, we continue to make outstanding progress on all fronts to achieve our Pillar Goals – Service, Safety, People, Growth and Finance – and to Get Healthcare Right for each other and all those we serve!
Thank you for everything you do, every day, to make TriHealth GREAT!
Overall Rating: Comments:
Awesome Bi3 grant awarded to Fernside. This resource for grief/loss/trauma support is tremendous.
Posted by: Karen Hipsher on July 24, 2023
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