Did you get a chance to attend our Best Practices Summit via Zoom on May 21, 2020? If not, you missed a great time with a lot of insights that were shared by folks from many OPOs across the country. But don’t fret, because we captured the whole event in the video below!
We started off with a meta-analysis from Sean Jordan at the Research & Planning Group (RPG) which talked about what it means for hospital partners to feel valued or not valued. RPG’s analysis included 12 recent OPO studies.
The analysis found that most hospital partners say they do feel valued because the OPO representatives they’ve worked with have gone out of their way to make them feel that way!
Some of the key words for feeling valued include:
- Collaborative
- Follow-up
- Appreciation
- Value
- Respectful
- Friendly
- Rapport
- Helpful
- Supportive
At the same time, about 12% of hospital partners express that they don’t feel valued at all, and a similar proportion can name at least one time where they haven’t felt valued. That means around 1 in 4 either do not feel valued or can still remember a time they felt like an OPO didn’t value them.
Some of the key words for feeling not valued include:
- Lack of Collaboration
- Bad Attitudes
- Bad Experiences
- Insensitive towards partners
- Insensitive towards families
- Lack of trust
- Lack of regard for my time
- Lack of communication
We had speakers from eight different OPOs share their journey and challenges in dealing with the changing context of COVID-19. These individuals included:
- Andrew Mullins (Lifeline of Ohio)
- Cynthia Daniels (Carolina Donor Services)
- Kim Zaruca (Life Connection of Ohio)
- Lindsey Speir (Mid-America Transplant)
- Dorothy Switzky (TOSA) – Slides
- Katie McKee (LifeSource) – Slides
- Tiffany Haydel (LOPA)
- Tania Houle (Legacy of Hope) – Slides
- Hedi Aguiar and Dr. Harry Wilkins (Fundamental Roots)
(You can click on the links for each presenter above to see their presentation. Please contact us if you would like to know how to get in touch with any of these folks.)
Afterwards, we moved into a breakout session and got eight really great discussions going as folks from around the country talked about what they’ll be doing next. Here’s a categorized list of the ideas they mentioned in our chat exercise towards the end!
THANK YOU VIDEOS (15)
- Loved the donor family video – excellent idea Tania! Kudos to your team.
- I love the idea of the thank you video from Donor Family/Recipients!
- And the donor family video.
- Also sharing videos from donor families with hospital staff.
- Thank you videos
- I love the Thank You Video and we are going to partner with our Community Education department to start working on one soon.
- Creating Thank You videos.
- Videos for hospital staff – both from donor families and OPO team – expressing gratitude.
- physician video thanking them!
- A Video from staff thanking Hospitals for their work and dedication.
- physician thank you videos
- physician thank you video
- Thank You videos.
- I also like the thank you videos
- Expression of gratitude through different media endeavors.
PARK & PRAY CEREMONY OUTSIDE HOSPITAL (7)
- Also loved the Park & Pray idea! Awesome Kim!
- I really liked the Park and Pray in place of the honor walk
- Park & pray was really cool too
- I also love the “Park and Pray” Covid has changed end of life so this will enable us to support our donor families
- I like the idea of park & pray when donor walk is not possible!
- park and pray in lieu of honor walks
- park and pray is an awesome idea
VIRTUAL EDUCATION AND WORKSHOPS (7)
- Increasing virtual education blended with on-site education.
- Virtual workshops
- Virtual Physician Panel by Hedi, brilliant!
- Utilizing virtual education more!
- Engaging physicians through virtual meetings
- continue the virtual option for meetings
- Use of technology for education to our hospitals
NEWSLETTERS (4)
- I will also look at hospital partner newsletter
- creating a news letter for each hospital
- newsletter!
- E-newsletter (highlights/spotlights)
READ ‘THE ART OF EFFECTIVE PHYSICIAN COMMUNICATION’ BY HEDI AGUIAR AND DR. HARRY WILKINS (4)
- Will be ordering the book by Aguiar & Wilkins – sounds awesome!
- Great book Hedi and Harry!
- I will be ordering the book as well
- amazon has the book for 14.95
A PRIVATE FACEBOOK GROUP (3)
- The private FB group for hospitals.
- Love Tania Houle’s idea of FB private page!
- Private Facebook Group for hospitals
FAXING THANK YOU FLYERS (2)
- Faxing in thank you flyers
- Faxes as a method for reaching people during this time
MICROSOFT SWAY (2)
- Microsoft Sway- explore how to best use it.
- Thanks to Tracy Wright from LifeCenter for educating me on SWAY presentations…my team is excited
SAYING THANKS (2)
- thank hospital heroes for caring for our donation heroes
- The power of a thank you!
OTHER COOL IDEAS (8)
- Individual video chats with hospital partners.
- team marathon miles and dedicating marathons to hospital partners to using chart access to customize recognition to maintaining the personal connections that drive our work…I am inspired!
- use of TEAMS on interviews
- recognition of behind the scenes OPO staff
- Chalk art outside hospitals
- Improved team communication
- Continued internal staff surveys
- Host “Coffee Breaks” for our Hospital Partners-COVID roundtable!
We had a fantastic time at this Summit, and we are deeply appreciative to all who could attend, present and/or help moderate the event. We would love to do another one down the road, and we’re hopeful we can get even more OPOs involved in sharing best practices and collaborating to work together to face the challenges of the changes that COVID-19 has brought to the health care community!
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