July 6, 2010
Innovative Collaborative Care Model Spreads into Eight-floor Expansion
Appleton Medical Center's new eight-story pavilion, which opens to patients on Mon., July 19, will lower costs, shorten lengths of stays for patients, and offer greater efficiencies for staff.
The project is part of a $90 million, three-year initiative launched in 2008 at Appleton Medical Center (AMC) and Theda Clark Medical Center in Neenah. The new building at AMC and renovated nursing units at Theda Clark are designed to support ThedaCare’s revolutionary Collaborative Care model of inpatient care. Not only is the project significantly less expensive than building new hospitals, the efficiency and quality of the Collaborative Care model, once fully implemented, will help offset the cost of renovation and construction.
As part of Collaborative Care, a care team — made up of a physician, nurse and pharmacist and supported by care managers, therapists and other clinicians — works side-by-side along with the patient and his or her family to create a single plan of care that is followed from admission through discharge from the hospital. Since implementing Collaborative Care in a 14-bed unit at AMC, ThedaCare has documented shorter length of stays for patients, fewer medication reconciliation errors, lower costs per stay, and improved patient satisfaction ratings.
Kathryn Correia, president of AMC and Theda Clark and ThedaCare senior vice president, said ThedaCare employees worked together using the health system’s lean initiatives to create, develop and constantly improve the way inpatient hospital care is delivered.
“The new care model and the facilities designed to support it stem from the passion and commitment of our employees,” she said, adding that ThedaCare is seeking to patent the Collaborative Care model since it’s so unique. “An exciting part of the project has been that employees played a key role throughout the entire process. We came up with the ideas and then trialed them to see what works and what didn’t. It’s been an incredible journey of continuous improvement.”
Many physician partners who see patients hospitalized at AMC and Theda Clark have also participated in Collaborative Care and have been instrumental in its success. “As we continue to spread Collaborative Care to each nursing unit and work with different specialty physicians, we gain more insight on how to better care for different medical conditions,” said Correia.
The PUBLIC will have an opportunity to see AMC’s new pavilion during a community open house and learn more about Colloborative Care from 5 to 8 p.m., Wed., July 14.
Media are invited to tour the facility, interview hospital leaders, and see an interactive experience of the patient, family and care team, from 4-6 p.m. on Tues., July 13. If interested in attending, RSVP to Megan Wilcox, corporate and public relations specialist for ThedaCare, at (920) 830-5847.
On July 19, AMC’s new emergency department entrance will open. The entrance is behind the new building. Patients should follow the clearly marked Emergency signs off of Meade and Grant streets.
Another change is that AMC will now have two main entrances. The current main entrance will become the West Entrance. The entrance to the new care pavilion will be known as the East Entrance. Except for visitors to the birth center, all other guests should use the new East entrance when visiting a patient. All entrances will be clearly marked on the building and parking signage will help direct visitors.
The Boldt Construction Co. began construction on the AMC pavilion in the fall of 2008. The pavilion’s 112 rooms replace ones in the hospital’s original 1958 building that cannot be adapted to the new unit and design model.
At Theda Clark, construction crews have been going floor-by-floor remodeling rooms and units to incorporate the Collaborative Care model. Two units have been completed at Theda Clark with more units scheduled for completion over the next 18 months.
The changes at AMC and Theda Clark allow patients to experience a higher quality of care because they no longer need to wait for the nurse, doctor, pharmacist, or other medical personnel to track each other down and figure out what to do next to progress the patient, said Matthew Furlan, chief operating officer for AMC and Theda Clark.
“The new building at AMC provides a quiet and private environment for our patients, and space for the team of caregivers to come together and collaborate around one plan of care that is developed along with the patient and family. The result is higher quality at a lower cost,” he said, adding the collaborative care pilot project has shown to reduce the length of a patient’s stay up to 20 percent. “That shorter length of stay reduces the hospital’s operating costs, which in turn will pay for the new building.”
The hospitals’ new nursing units and private room design include innovations that not only support Collaborative Care, but more effective, efficient, and customer-focused care in every unit, including those devoted to patients receiving specialty care such as neuro, cardiac, cancer, OB-GYN, orthopedic and surgical care. In addition to process innovations, the transformation includes bedside workstations, wireless computers on wheels, and nursing workspaces in the corridor adjacent to patient rooms.
AMC’s pavilion also includes energy efficiencies to lower utility costs and decrease the building’s overall carbon footprint, said Albert Parks, director of facilities at AMC and Theda Clark. “We utilized some of the most recent technology available to create a building that’s not only comfortable to those working and staying there, but is also energy efficient, allowing us to be better environmental stewards,” he said, adding that Boldt Construction utilized an ambitious recycling program onsite to cut down on waste.
Appleton Medical Center is a 160-bed acute care hospital that opened in 1958. In addition to general medical and surgical care, services include the Appleton Heart Institute, which was the first and most advanced cardiac care program to be established north of Madison and Milwaukee more than 30 years ago. Other specialized services include an emergency department, birthing services, the Groth Surgery Center, and the Martha Siekman Cancer Center and ThedaCare Cancer Institute, which includes radiation oncology, CyberKnife®, TomoTherapy™ and stereotactic radiotherapy and radiosurgery. Appleton Medical Center is an accredited Chest Pain Center by the national Society of Chest Pain Centers.
ThedaCare™ (www.thedacare.org) is a community-owned health system consisting of Appleton Medical Center, Theda Clark Medical Center, New London Family Medical Center, Riverside Medical Center in Waupaca, ThedaCare Physicians, Ingenuity First, and other health care services. ThedaCare is the largest employer in Northeast Wisconsin with 5,400 employees.
For more information, media may contact Megan Wilcox (megan.wilcox@thedacare.org), corporate and public relations specialist for ThedaCare, at (920) 830-5847, or pager (920) 554-0730.