The idea of giving patients an extraordinary experience means building connections with everyone who comes through the door and maintaining that level of service throughout a hospital stay.
Texas Health Hospital Frisco had the opportunity to create a culture of these experiences from scratch, planning while its leaders were still meeting in trailers during construction. Among the first developments: They created a credo using “WOW” as an acronym: Warm welcome, Out of this world experience, What could we do better?
“Patient experience has always been a passion of mine,” said Brett Lee, hospital president. “But all my experiences had been retrofitting concepts to existing organizations. I’d never had the opportunity to say, ‘This is how we operate this facility’ from the very beginning.'”
The idea that Texas Health patients should have extraordinary experiences aligns with the consumer-centric care focus of the system in achieving Vision 2026. Defining those experiences and making them a part of the culture evolved into a detailed plan at Texas Health Frisco.
A WOW credo
Adriane Vasquez, M.B.A., P.T., M.P.T., took the ball and ran with it as director of rehabilitation, cardiopulmonary and customer experience.
First, she put together a team of leaders and front-line caregivers. The ways to embed the WOW concept into everyday hospital life evolved into carefully constructed mandatory classes for employees with well-trained instructors and long-term, quarterly reeducation
The concept also means incorporating little things that matter a lot to consumers as they experience some of the most stressful times of their lives: fresh flowers in every room, employees who walk patients and visitors to their destinations rather than pointing, a ban on gazing into a phone while walking down the halls.
Helping patients, rewarding employees
Employees find their WOW work rewarding as well. Neelohitha Kotha, pictured left, a nuclear medicine technologist, has received many WOW certificates in the program. Certificates are given for going the extra mile to create a WOW experience for patients.
In one case, a patient preparing for a test mentioned that he was hungry, having fasted since the night before. Kotha asked what he liked to eat for breakfast and had it ready for him as soon as he stepped out of the procedure room.
“He was so touched and moved,” Kotha said. “Small gestures mean a lot to me personally. I like to make people feel loved, cared about, that they’re important to me and that their time is important.”
Elsewhere in the hospital, a COVID-19 patient who came into the Emergency Department and quickly took a turn for the worse benefited from “Picture Perfect,” a program in which family members are given a flash drive to record photos, videos and messages to be played on the in-room TV. Nurses played the contents repeatedly, even while he was on a ventilator, so that when he woke up that was the first thing he saw.
Later, nurses brought him a blanket emblazoned with the name of his favorite team, North Dakota, because he was always cold. Discharged after a two-week stay, the man wrote a letter saying how grateful he was for the extra care.
Gauging the effect
The hospitals’ Press Ganey patient satisfaction scores help tell the story of how well the WOW program is working — Texas Health Frisco is in the top decile nationwide.
Vasquez’s team scours the consumer responses, drawing new ideas for WOW experiences from patients’ direct words. Every morning, the leadership meeting includes a WOW story at the end.
Lee insisted the WOW effort continue even through the challenges of a COVID-19 surge. For example, the Texas Department of State Health Services sent nurses to Frisco to help with COVID-19 patients and they received the WOW training.
“Everybody matters,” said Dort Foglia, Ph.D., M.S., B.S.N., R.N., NEA-BC, chief nursing officer. “We’re here to serve them and get them home safely. The way we’re going to get there is following these principles, so it’s done consistently every single time.”
(Pictured top right: Adriane Vasquez, M.B.A., P.T., M.P.T., director of rehabilitation, cardiopulmonary and customer experience, is a key force behind Texas Health Frisco’s WOW initiative.)
By Judy Wiley • Posted April 13, 2021
