Healthcare organizations often discover their strongest professionals are dedicating critical energy to data collection-related tasks. However, any amount of time spent on abstracting data is time not spent using their specialized knowledge to drive or support performance improvement initiatives. A desire for more performance improvement leads many hospitals to pursue smartsourcing.
As a result, the question many organizations have following the smartsourcing process is, what’s next?
How can organizations use this transition to boost and bolster their quality improvement teams in the healthcare setting?
Continue reading to learn how to utilize your staff’s competencies to refocus and transform your hospital’s quality improvement team.
Smartsourcing is the process of determining whether an organization is truly utilizing the core competencies of its staff members. It is driven by a desire to innovate and improve rather than merely cut costs. Consequently, in many cases, it can increase your organization’s ROI on a number of levels.
Moreover, smartsourcing allows teams to retain their talent as they improve. The result is a new, intimate relationship with a carefully selected vendor. The vendor’s core competencies should be a stronger match for certain tasks, such as data abstraction. Think of it like adding an extension to your existing quality improvement team.
Here is how to best utilize quality improvement team members in healthcare after smartsourcing.
Data abstraction is a time-consuming process. A crucial step in improving quality teams after smartsourcing is allowing professionals to use that knowledge and energy elsewhere.
A great real world example of this comes from a case study about Loma Linda University Health. Brenda Bruneau, Assistant Vice President of Quality & Patient Safety, addressed challenges the system had in meeting their Comprehensive Stroke measures by assigning a previous data abstractor to join forces with their operations and Epic EHR teams. Through their collaboration resulted in an EHR summary view, providing a real-time snapshot of each stroke patient’s care trajectory and highlighting any unmet performance elements, like missing NIH scores at admission.
As a result, their efforts have led to consistently meeting Comprehensive Stroke standards, avoiding emergency interventions, and retaining their Comprehensive Stroke Center Certification. The success of this project led to Bruneau’s team being asked to showcase their work at an Epic conference.
“That work was able to be done because the individuals who know that data best were able to partner with our operations and Epic teams to say, ‘How do we do this better?’” Bruneau said.
This is a perfect example of the opportunity cost many quality directors don’t see when handling data in house. If that former abstractor was still actively spending the majority of her time collecting data, she wouldn’t have been able to use her knowledge on a more impactful PI project like this.
It can be hard to see a tangible benefit of the road not taken. Fortunately, we can learn from pioneers in quality who are reaching new heights with their Smartsourcing strategy.
Healthcare teams with quality improvement goals don’t always move quickly. Team members frequently labor under the weight of multiple competing responsibilities. In understaffed facilities, this burden is even greater. In fact, understaffed facilities are the most in need of increased patient safety measures.
A 2023 study from the JAMA Health Forum suggests the key to burnout reduction begins at the organizational level. Specifically, smartsourcing shifts the daily workloads of your most competent team members to more fulfilling PI work. Therefore, this leads to improved work-life balance and, thus, improved staff retention. This further reduces the need for hiring, training, and orienting new team members.
Consider this success story from Loma Linda University Health: “All of my individuals who did abstraction previously are nurses. So for them to see that their knowledge of the data, workflows, and processes and their contribution with the team in making care better for patients, that’s invaluable,” said Brenda Bruneau, Assistant Vice President of Quality & Patient Safety. “Because they then get to look at what’s happened with our data outcomes, celebrate those things, and move on to the next area of opportunity. It’s very fulfilling to those individuals. It is important to folks to know that the work that they’re doing is positively impacting patient outcomes.”
Dr. Debra Sowell, DPN, RN, explains, “In the recent past, QI followed only the detection of undesirable occurrences.” An emphasis on the negative can trickle down, impacting the overall culture of your hospital or healthcare facility.
Moreover, a recent study from MIT Sloan suggests that toxic workplace cultures are the greatest force driving resignation in 2023.
Thus, a focus on quality improvement is an opportunity to emphasize positive change from the top down. When your team has the freedom to make positive, actionable, data-driven changes, everyone benefits. Hospitals retain talented staff, and patients receive quality care.
Per the Department of Health and Human Services, there can be no quality improvement without data. Likewise, there can be no quality improvement without talented, high-performing innovators.
Since Smartsourcing data abstraction removes the burden of routine data collection, consider shifting former abstractors to performance improvement specialist roles. They may already have an understanding of current gaps and ideas for how to close them.
A stronger depth of understanding provides quality improvement team members with the context they need to innovate. Rather than merely documenting, they can actively utilize data to make improvements. As a result, they gain the time and space they need to experiment. This freedom can lead to creative and targeted improvements that would not have been impossible in the past.
Elevate the impact of your hospital’s quality improvement teams with our smartsourcing strategies. When our team focuses on your organization’s data abstraction needs, your team is free to focus on innovation, culture, and care.
Learn more about smartsourcing clinical data abstraction services with American Data Networks.
Sources
How to Implement a Hospital Good Catch Program