Off and Running: Following up on the Sprint

It seems so often we never feel ready to begin action. I know in my case, I like to plan in ways that I can avoid all possibility of failure. In doing so, I often delay getting started on things that are really important to me. In fact, in some cases, the more important the outcome of something is to me the more I seem to delay getting started.

A couple of weeks ago, I shared news from the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) National Forum. The IHI introduced three new areas of work to us this year, as well as, the Improvement Map (if you're interested in reading a recent article about the Map and the new interventions from Healthleaders Media click here) .

Do you remember I asked for you to join me in a sprint to the summit? Well the department of surgery is off and running.

Here is a message I received from Dr Ramon Berguer, Head of the Department of Surgery

"Trial completed with both WHO and SCOAP checklists (total 4 cases). Overall quite positive, some redundancy we can modify. When I had to do a case without them this am I actually felt uncomfortable. In every case something was shared that one of the members either didn't know or forgot. I'll give you more details some other time. We'll continue to trial them and modify as needed. We'll be discussing this at PCC and will move forward with gradual implementation after we refine it a bit more."

This is a great example of leadership on the part of the surgery department. I am impressed with their nimble response and look forward to hearing about the future learning and discovery as they continue to test the use of the checklist under a variety of conditions.

Believe it or not, I was a runner as a young person. My strength was distance running, although I did run the 800-meter, which is considered a dash/sprint. What I learned when running relays was that the race was divided into different segments or 'legs,' and the team strengths were spread out throughout the course of the race. As I reflect on the work going on in the surgery department, it looks like the runner has left the blocks and leg one is underway!

I applaud the perioperative team and would like to thank them for getting us started on our 'Sprint to the Summit'.

More thoughts on this very soon…
Anna