♪ (upbeat intro music) ♪
(Jon) Hello, welcome to Take 5 with the Joint Commission.
I'm Jon DePaolis, and I'll be your host for today's episode.
Today, I'm sitting down with special principal consultant
with Joint Commission Resources, Lisa Hardesty,
to discuss how JCR has adapted its services
to provide better support to customers
during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
Thanks for joining me today, Lisa.
(Lisa) Thank you.
(Jon) Lisa, what if our customers told us
about how their organization has been affected during the pandemic?
(Lisa) Yeah, so Jon, we've reached out
and asked our customers about managing the six critical areas
in emergency management.
Not surprised, during the pandemic,
resources and assets seem to be the most challenging area in hospitals
that were heavily impacted with the number of COVID-19 patients.
In other hospitals that were less impacted
and didn't have a large influx of patients,
staffing really seemed to be their number one challenge
and their biggest impact.
As you would expect, earlier in the pandemic,
most hospitals were significantly impacted
by the decisions to stop their elective procedures.
Today, a hospital's biggest challenge
is really around preparing for the delivery, storing,
and administering vaccine.
In addition to these challenges that are taking place during the pandemic,
customers are also contacting us and telling us
that they're struggling with their after-action report.
(Jon) What are some of the things that JCR is doing
to help customers navigate that after-action reporting?
(Lisa) Yeah, so what we're doing is,
is we can really help assist our clients with this process.
So, when we assist, we're looking to help our customers
as they prepare their response and evaluate their recovery
regarding what did and did not go well.
We helped identify potential opportunities for improvement
as well as developing an action plan
and mitigation strategy to prepare for the future.
We developed a tracking tool to use
while responding to the actual events,
and in this case, it's COVID-19.
So specifically,
there's a placeholder and summary for the 1135 Waivers.
Tracking changes that need to be made to the emergency operation plan
is also included.
We have developed templates
for the evaluation of the after-action report,
and there are tracers and worksheets for each of the six critical areas
for our consultants to use for guidance
to ensure that they are addressing all the potential challenges
and also to ensure that we're consistent with our approach.
In order to help for future emergencies,
we can help perform a gap analysis
for the execution of the emergency operations plan.
The entire process can be provided on-site or virtually.
We have invested in training and technology
for delivering virtual engagement,
so our customers receive the same valuable, customized
and in-depth knowledge we've previously delivered on-site.
(Jon) How do you think JCR is uniquely positioned
to help organizations during this time?
(Lisa) One of the things that I'm really proud of
within Joint Commission Resources
is Joint Commission Resources' multi-disciplinary group of experts,
which is made up of engineers, physicians, infection preventionists, nurses,
and we also have former CMS surveyors,
so we're uniquely positioned to help organizations
facilitate the completion of after-action reviews and beyond,
or when it comes to emergency management.
Our approach partners,
environmental care experts, the clinical experts,
do work with this organization to facilitate an after-action report.
Having our experts from each side
helps overlay familiar languages and process.
The language differences are really between standard hospital terminology
and the terminology used by local state and federal emergency responders.
Often, activation of a hospital's emergency operations plan
introduces terminology that's used by, for example,
the National Incident Management System,
or NIMS.
And there's also the Hospital Incident Command System,
which is referred to as HIC or HICS,
depending upon what part of the country you're from.
It is very different terminology than the standard healthcare terminology,
and it may be confusing to hospital staff.
During the facilitation,
our team who can complement each role
within the incident command structure of a hospital,
we will help with understanding terminology,
bridge the knowledge gaps
between the Incident Command Staff and the hospital staff,
that may be more front-line staff
that's not actively involved in or doesn't actively participate
with the command center.
We use a collaborative approach to help bring roles and viewpoints
across the organization together,
so that they're easily understood and more meaningful,
and understood by all staff within the organization.
As a result, this review will help an organization understand
what was done well to maintain and build upon those strengths,
but also identify what needs to be improved on
by creating the after-action report as an action plan,
that is used to track the recovery, all the tactics,
and those other actions that were taken or that were developed
throughout the response to this particular emergency,
and then we can build upon them
so that they are better prepared for the next emergency.
(Jon) Lisa, if you were to give one piece of encouragement
or maybe advice to hospitals,
what would it be?
(Lisa) What we've seen is hospitals with dedicated staff
that have exceeded expectations across the healthcare spectrum.
Every staff member has committed
to keep patient and staff safety in the forefront
during this pandemic,
and they've succeeded.
It's going to take the commitment of every hospital resource
to continue this.
We hope to stand with hospitals for support emergency operations
and to work with you to fulfill your vision.
It is certainly a really tough time out there,
and we do want to give a nod to those heroes
who in those hospitals are working every single day
in dealing with COVID-19.
(Jon) And Lisa, if people want more information
about what we've talked about today,
where should they go?
(Lisa) I would recommend that they go to Joint Commission Resources' website.
There's a significant amount of information out there
that's posted on a regular basis.
There's also a link that will take them
to The Joint Commission COVID-19 website.
Again, a lot of information, resources, and tools are available on that.
Our website is www.jcrinc.com
for folks who want to head there.
(Jon) Lisa, thank you so much for chatting with me today.
(Lisa) Oh, thank you.
It's been my pleasure, definitely been a great opportunity,
so thank you.
(Jon) You can find more episodes of this program
at The Joint Commission's website
found at www.jointcommission.org
This has been Take 5 with the Joint Commission.
♪ (upbeat outro music) ♪