Promising practices improve safety for patients and Veterans

Gulf Coast VA is recognized on the VA Diffusion Marketplace for three innovative promising practices that have been successfully implemented and are available to adopt nationwide.

The VA Diffusion Marketplace is a database and collaborative tool that assists with discovery and engagement in diffusing successful promising practices centered on clinical, operational and strategic innovations.

Gulf Coast VA has two practices from the Office of Safety. The Employee Safety Incident Investigation Program and the Fire Safety and TMS QR Code Badges were added to the national database to improve safety challenges within VA. The Employee Safety Incident Investigation Program (ESIIP) was developed and implemented to improve the process for employee injury data.

The ESIIP allows a safety supervisor to make assignments to safety staff and track progress or send back reports for further follow up. The safety team worked with staff at Performance Logic to develop an intuitive innovative tool database to not only report safety incidents but also analyze data.

Program will save almost 300 employee hours

“Analysis of data is critical for safety staff in working to reduce employee injuries and illnesses to determine required corrective actions,” says Jennifer Adams, safety manager.

Data regarding this promising practice proves the ESIIP will save approximately 296 employee hours each year. The ESIIP promising practice has been adopted successfully at three other VA facilities.

The Fire Safety and TMS QR Code Badges is the second Safety practice recognized. This innovative practice combines the use of modified TMS utility software program and wireless scanners to manage attendance electronically during facility fire drills. Each staff member’s badge is scanned when re-entering the facility after a fire drill to document attendance which eliminates cumbersome traditional sign in sheets.

“This is an innovative process that was much needed to quickly and accurately record staff participation to allow them to get back to patient care,” said Safety Specialist Randy Rohrbacher.

The safety team is the first facility to implement this process and provide learning assistance to the national TMS office in using the bar code component. Future uses other than just fire drill safety can be used for other training courses as well.

Improving air quality in operating rooms

The Peri-Operative staff are recognized for the third promising practice. Eliminating hazardous surgical smoke improves the air quality in the operating room for patients and staff. Surgical smoke is the unwanted by-product of energy-generating devices that are used in 90 percent of all surgeries. Studies compare the inhalation of smoke from vaporized human tissue to the smoke created by 27-30 cigarettes.

Gulf Coast VA requires smoke evacuation devices be used in all procedures that require electrocautery, including the operating rooms and clinical areas. The Association of Perioperative Registered Nurses awarded Gulf Coast VA the Gold Level Go Clear Award. The Diffusion Marketplace is managed by the Diffusion of Excellence within the VHA Innovation Ecosystem. Learn more about the Diffusion Marketplace.