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NCHN E-News | Issue 2 | February 23, 2009 |
In This Issue...
|
From
the Board of Directors
Honorees will be announced during the Awards Luncheon beginning at 11:45 AM on April 22, 2009, at the NCHN Annual Conference in Charleston, South Carolina. ******* New Website ******* NCHN Blog New --top-- 15th
Annual Conference - Register Today! Conference agenda, registration materials, and hotel information are available on the NCHN website at www.nchn.org I encourage you to register today and to reserve your room as Charleston is the place to be April 20-22! The deadline for early bird registration is March 31. The hotel cut off date for the conference rate of $166, plus taxes, is March 26 -- so make your reservations today! ******* President's Dinner ******* Crucial Conversations® Patient safety, quality care, productivity, employee morale, and leadership effectiveness are all key elements that every health care organization must keep in focus if it is to achieve its goals. Even with the best laid plans, many organizations still struggle to accomplish the results they envision. What are the conversations that you are not holding or holding well, that are preventing your organization from getting the results you want? Many problems that plague organizations are rooted in the same cause: perplexed staff who are not quite sure how to bring up touchy, controversial, and complex issues and resolve them. These problems are especially pronounced when emotions are involved, opinions vary, and the stakes are high. Wipfli uses the power of Crucial Conversations® Mastery Course by VitalSmarts® to help individuals, teams, and organizations. Step and hold crucial conversations well, thereby beginning to achieve the performance they seek. Tina Sundly, Health Care Strategic Alignment Manager, with Wipfli, is a certified trainer of Crucial Conversations® and will be providing the training in Charleston for NCHN. --top-- Members News Larry Leaming, Western Healthcare Alliance stated, “I think that the NRHA / NCHN Policy Institute was a very worthwhile experience. I’ve been to DC a number of times to talk to our congressional leadership and frequently they, and their staff, are just too busy to talk to you. Visiting with a group of home state constituents and mentioning the NRHA and the Rural Health Policy Institute seemed to open doors and attract the attention of the representatives and their health policy staff. It was especially impressive when you consider that it was barely a week after the Presidential Inauguration and the $800+ billion dollar economic stimulus package bill was being actively negotiated.” NCHN members enjoyed a time of networking and sharing over Sunday evening dinner. Special thanks to Jon Smith, The Hospital Cooperative, ID for treating the members. Plan now to attend the 2010 Policy Institute … January 25-27! ******* NCHN Welcomes Four New Members Since
the First of the Year The Network was a recipient of a 2008 Network Planning grant and is still in the development stage. Their current major project is working with the state to ensure that the rural women have better access to state programs in rural Arizona. Holly Crump is the Director. Copper River Regional Health Network, located
in Copper Center, Alaska recently joined NCHN. The network was organized
in 2006 and its mission is to develop a comprehensive, coordinated
health care delivery system that maximizes resources within the region
by commitment to ethical and respectful partnerships. The network
has 12 members located in its geographic area, which is the Copper
River Region of Alaska. Kris Winter is the Network Coordinator.
Northeastern Rural Health Network, located in Chesterfield, SC is NCHN’s newest member. The network was organized in 2007 and consists of 9 members from Chesterfield and Marlboro counties. Melinda A. Merrell is the Network Coordinator. Its mission is to develop a collaborative, economically viable health network to improve the health status of the citizens in their region. Samaritan Scotland Putnam Rural Health Network (SSPRHN), located in Macon, Missouri joined NCHN in January. The network was organized in 2008. Its mission is to maintain a network of Critical Access Hospitals that identifies and implements collaborative strategies to improve health delivery, health of the community and network sustainability. Network collaboration will focus on the following programs and services:
The network has 5 members located in its geographic area, which includes Macon, Milan, Memphis, Unionville and Hermann, Missouri. Angela Bruner is the Network Coordinator. --top-- Member Success Stories
“Health Assist Tennessee offers interpretation in twelve other languages statewide,” explains Belma Ismailovich, coordinator of Health Assist Tennessee’s Interpretation Services. “But it’s impossible to do a sign language interpretation over the phone.” According to the Tennessee Association of the Deaf, more than 500,000 Tennesseans are deaf or hard of hearing. It can be hard to find trained interpreters in urban areas, and in rural areas, they are even rarer. Health Assist Tennessee’s telehealth equipment will not be used just for sign language interpretation, but for all the languages they offer. As Dranda Whaley, executive director of Health Assist Tennessee, notes, “Interpretation means more than literally translating words. Physical and cultural cues are integral to communication, and accurately interpreting that level of communication can make a huge difference in treatment recommendations and health outcomes.” For more information about the organization, call Health Assist Tennessee’s Community Awareness Coordinator at 615-313-9841 x. 304. You can read the complete news release at: http://www.communityhealth.net/index.php?page=health-assist-1-21-009 --top-- Spotlight
on NCHN Business Partner PMI, an affiliate of Stroudwater Associates, works with more than 180 hospital clients in 29 states. PMI partners with numerous state networks and hospital systems to provide a platform for monitoring and performance. PMI offers a broad range of technology and consulting services to link healthcare organizations’ performance improvement programs to strategy and operations. The work of PMI is strongly rooted in the Balanced Scorecard methodology for strategy execution as developed by Kaplan and Norton. Through extensive work in the field, PMI offers rich perspective, helping organizations translate their strategic vision into clear objectives. They link these objectives to measurable indicators and initiatives, a process that enables performance monitoring and improvement. The Balanced Scorecard integrates four critical perspectives: quality, finance, operations and satisfaction of customers, physicians and staff. The powerful RPM platform is PMI’s solution for customized and benchmarked performance monitoring. Understanding that each project is unique, PMI utilizes the flexibility of the Balanced Scorecard to deliver custom solutions. There are some areas in which PMI may advise organizations to adopt best practice indicators. This enables performance benchmarking of affiliates in an appropriate, relevant manner. Michael Topchik is the contact for NCHN members. You can locate additional information about PMI and their services at www.pmi-healthcare.com --top-- Upcoming
NCHN Events ******* 2009 Regional Meetings Survey The 2009 Regional meetings will be held in:
Mark your calendars and save the dates! ******* Special GrantStation
Tour for NCHN Members --top-- Elsewhere
in the News The HWIC, www.healthworkforceinfo.org, will provide free access to the most recent resources on the nation’s health workforce in one easy-to-use online location. Operated by UND’s School of Medicine and Health Sciences, the center will offer the latest on:
In addition, information specialists will be on hand with customized assistance to locate statistics, create data-based maps, develop lists of possible funding sources, supply publications and connect users to the right organizations or federal programs. Users can contact the specialists online or by phone or fax. This will be an important tool for you and your network members. We are pleased that Laura Trude, HWIC Information Specialist will be attending the 15th Annual NCHN Conference and will be doing a presentation on Monday, April 20 at 1:30PM about the Health Workforce Information Center and their services. Laura will also be available in the exhibit area to discuss the Center and services with you on an individual basis. You can register for the conference at www.nchn.org ******* Peanut Butter Recall Recalled products in the widget will be updated automatically by the FDA so the content will always be current, giving your site access to the most up-to-date recall information. To add this widget to your page, please visit www.cdc.gov/widgets. You
can also find info on the peanut butter recall at --top-- |
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