Quint Studer's Blog: Supporting and Appreciating Emergency Departments

From the blog of Quint Studer of the Studer Group:

After spending time on Saturday, February 24, 2007, with more than 1,400 emergency nurses at the Emergency Nurses Association meeting in Boston, I feel so much better. I saw such dedication to the health care calling, motivation to learn how to be even better leaders, and perseverance to keep striving to make a difference in health care. My flame got brighter thanks to these 1,400 difference makers.

At the session, I described something I was part of years ago that worked to improve outcomes. We had all department directors and members of the senior team spend one full shift working in the emergency department shadowing an emergency department staff member. At times working in an emergency department is similar to working at a desk at an airport. Both emergency staff and airport staff report delays, changes, and cancellations. While these are caused by other factors, the people at the desk take the brunt of others’ frustrations.

After experiencing a shift in the emergency department, many leaders went back to their own departments and fixed things to make service better for the emergency department; some leaders took ideas from the emergency department and improved their areas. All leaders left the emergency department with better relationships with emergency staff members.

Have leaders spend a shift in the emergency department and it will create better outcomes.