Teachers of Quality Academy 2.0

July 2016 – May 2017 – Program Director: Dr. Niti Armistead

TQA 2.0 Quality Improvement Projects

TQA Fellow	Department	Project Title	AIM Statement
Elijah Asagbra	Dept of Health Services and Info Management	Improving Alumni Survey Response Rates: Evaluating the Dissemination Strategy	To increase the HSM program alumni survey response rate in order to meet the certification requirement of AUPHA. Specifically, this study will determine if changes adopted using the PDSA cycle should be continued in future surveys, as well as identify which of the three dissemination methods is preferred by alumni of the health services management program.
Francis Buckman	VMC - Internal Medcine	Decreasing Discharge Times of Patients Going to Skilled Nursing Facilty from a Hospitalist General Medical Floor, 3East at Vidant Medical Center	To decrease the time interval between discharge order time and actual departure time of nursing home patients to 2 hours or less on 20% of all Nursing Home patients from 3 East (Hospitalist General Medicine Floor) within 3 months.
Sue Anne Fipps	VMC - Eastern Carolina Injury Prevention Program	Safety Starts with Vidant - Newborn Child Passenger Seat Inspection on Discharge	To initiate a formalized child passenger safety program in Labor and Delivery Side A, ensuring that all newborns met with a CPST prior to discharge.
LaToya Griffin	Dept of Pharmacology and Toxicology	Practical Approaches to Improving Student Learning & Satisfaction in Clinical Simulations: A Case Study in Medical Pharmacology	To improve the efficacy and efficiency with which human clinical simulation labs are delivered to increase student learning and satisfaction.
Christy Harding	Vidant Medical Center	Earlier Departure of Patients Discharged to Nursing Homes from 3 East	To decrease the time interval between discharge order time and actual departure time of nursing home patients to 2 hours or less on 25% of all nursing home patients discharged by ambulance from 3 east (Hospitalist General Medicine Floor) in the next six months.
Laura Hartman	Dept of Family Medicine	Test Follow-Up as a Proxy for Improving Patient-Centeredness	To improve the CG CAHPS score “Follow-up on Test Results” in the Family Medicine gold module by 1.1% (from 63.0% to 64.1%) by March 2017.
Robert Hartman	Dept of Pediatrics	Identifying a Mechanism to Improve Health Literacy among Adults with Congenital Heart Defects	To identify a mechanism for which Adult Congenital Cardiology (ACC) patients can provide their cardiac diagnoses/conditions to all medical providers, including providers who do not have access to EPIC, the electronic medical record (EMR) platform for ECU Physicians and Vidant Medical Center.
Triona Henderson	Dept of Pathology	Utilization of the Verigene Blood Culture Identification System to Promote Quality Improvement in the Laboratory	To improve the microbiology laboratory workflow and staff moral by reducing the number of steps required to process a specimen on the Nanosphere Verigene® Blood Culture Nucleic Acid Testing System by 10% and 30% respectively by June 30th, 2017.
Amanda Higginson	Dept of Pediatrics	Improved Physical Exam Documentation in a Pediatric After Hours Clinic	To improve detailed physical exam documentation by 10% over 1 month. Revised after cycle 1 to increase by an additional 5% after cycle 2 and 3
Ed Johnson	Dept of Pediatrics	Stop the Noise! A Framework for Improving Alarm Response Time on a Pediatric Unit	To have 90% of red alarms on a pediatric inpatient unit cleared by a healthcare provider within 3 minutes.
George Kasarala	Vidant Medical Center	Hyperglycemic Control in the Hospital	Decrease CLABSIs on 3 South by 75% in 6 months among patients with central lines by educating patients and families on the importance of proper CHG bathing techniques and having 100% compliance for daily CHG (Chlorhexidine gluconate) baths, as noted in the Electronic Health Record (EHR) documentation.
Hsiao Lai	Dept of Internal Medicine	Improving Global Assessment in Hemodialysis Patients with Frailty Scoring	Improve outcomes ESRD patients on hemodialysis therapy by applying a global frailty assessment score to identify patients at risk for decline for targeted therapies to re-establish resilience.
Sujitha Nandi	Dept of Internal Medicine	ECU General Internal Medicine Service Discharge before Noon Challenge	To increase the number of patients discharged by ECU General Internal Medicine service before noon to 20% within 6 months.
Martha Naylor	Dept of Pediatrics	Improvement in Communication of Transferred Patients to a Tertiary Care Facility to Referral Physicians/Nurseries to Improve Provider Satisfaction	Improve communication referral physicians by 50% in the next 6 months requesting transport via Eastcare or other Children’s hospital transport team to VMC NICU via written/phone communication within 1-5 days of admission, at discharge and monthly for patients with long lengths of stay to improve satisfaction and continued referrals.
Shiv Patil	Dept of Family Medicine	Improving Care of Patients with Diabetes using a Diabetes Registry	Improve the number of ACO-patients with diabetes at ECU FMC who have not had A1c done in the measurement year 2016 by 85% by August 31st, 2017 using a diabetes registry.
Joseph Pye	Vidant Medical Center	Improving Prevention Screening: Lessons Learned	Develop a colorectal cancer screening toolkit for use by ambulatory clinic staff in closing care gaps.
Laura Respess	Vidant Medical Center	Wiping out CLABSIs: Improving CHG Baths to Prevent Infection	Decrease CLABSIs on 3 South by 75% in 6 months among patients with central lines by educating patients and families on the importance of proper CHG bathing techniques and having 100% compliance for daily CHG (Chlorhexidine gluconate) baths, as noted in the Electronic Health Record (EHR) documentation.
Lorie Sigmon	ECU College of Nursing	Role Recognition, Responsibilities, and Communication between Disciplines: Nursing and Nutrition Student Perceptions	To assess and enhance interprofessional communication by increasing knowledge of roles and responsibilities between nursing (seniors) and nutrition (seniors) utilizing the Attitudes Towards Professional Health Care Teams (IHCT) and reflective tool yielding 75% positive attitudes towards interprofessional care by nursing and nutrition students over 6 months.
Jan Tillman	ECU College of Nursing	Did the Quality Improvement Process “Stick” for Doctor of Nursing Practice Student-Learners?	Students will identify one observable gap in quality at their final clinical practicum site and formulate a plan for QI based on rapid improvement cycles, using PDSA.
Jane Trapp	ECU College of Allied Health	Incentive Spirometry Education in Patients Undergoing Colorectal Surgery	Patients undergoing elective colo-rectal surgeries receiving face to face and written instruction will identify acknowledgement of instruction and basic purpose of IS in the peri-operative setting.
Mary Catherine Turner	Dept of Pediatrics	Implementing Quality Improvement in the APHC Resident Continuity Clinic	By May 31, 2017, all Med-Peds residents will have completed one QI project in resident continuity clinic that meets the Quality Metrics outlined by the Brody SOM Enterprise Quality Committee.
Shannon Tyler	Dept of Psychiatry	Will the Use of Weighted Blankets Reduce the Use of Restraints
Jan Wong	Dept of Surgery	Improving Patient Safety by Improving Patient Access to Care	To increase the number of patients discharged before noon on the Acute Care/Trauma and Surgical Oncology Surgical Services from the pre-intervention(s) levels to 50% of patients discharged in 6 months.