Quoteworthy
A positive learning environment creates a psychologically safe space where learners feel comfortable asking questions and can therefore gain the knowledge and skills crucial to becoming a health care provider.
Kathleen Timme

Most Recent
Hysterectomy Surgical Site Infection (SSI) Bundle Implementation​

Urogynecology specialist Whitney Hendrickson-Cahill details the steps an interdisciplinary team followed to reduce surgical site infections (SSIs) following hysterectomy procedures, aiming to improve patient outcomes, shorten recovery times, and reduce healthcare costs at University of Utah Health.

Holiday Procrastination is Not Your Friend

Believe it or not, the holidays have arrived. But have no fear, Senior Value Engineer Cindy Spangler is here with three steps you can take to carve out time now and avoid the woes of the holiday rush.

Shared Governance: A Foundation for a Culture of Nursing Excellence

Magnet Program Director Mary-Jean (Gigi) Austria explains how Nursing Shared Governance provides support for knowledge sharing, clinical skill building, and collaborative decision-making closest to the point of care.

Shared Governance: Harnessing Our Collective Strengths

Shared governance is a decision-making model designed to empower the people who care for patients. Chief Nursing Officer Tracey Nixon explains what it is, how it impacts you, and what to expect in the coming months.

TRUE Stories—Fostering a Passion for Solving Big Problems

Access to medical care isn't a given. Medical students from the Tribal, Rural, and Underserved Medical Education (TRUE) Graduate Certificate program tell us first-hand experiences that helped them build a passion for complex problem solving by experiencing big, systemic challenges up close.

How to Turn a Gut Feeling into a QI Project

Your gut tells you a process could be better than it is—how do you back that feeling up with hard data? Senior value engineer Luca Boi shows how undertaking a baseline analysis can jumpstart your improvement project.

Quality Improvement

Hospitalist Ryan Murphy introduces quality improvement (QI): The systematic and continuous approach to improvement.

How to Conduct a Rapid Critical Appraisal

Performing a rapid critical appraisal helps evaluate a study for its worth by ensuring validity, meaningful data, and significance to the patient. Contributors Barb Wilson, Mary Jean Austria, and Tallie Casucci share a checklist of questions to complete a rapid critical appraisal efficiently and effectively.

Stop Waiting and Start Working: Four Tips from the Help Desk

We all do it. We draw a blank on our password, get locked out of login, “…duo what?” and so on. And then we wait for a University of Utah Health service desk saint who makes our machine work again. To help lighten their load a bit—and make our lives easier—we asked ITS Manager Mike Madsen for his “Top 4” preventive measures to avoid a call.

What Improvement Taught Me About Gardening

Every summer, senior value engineer Cindy Spangler stocks our offices with an abundance of tomatoes, zucchini, and squash. We asked her to share how improvement thinking influences her gardening. Turns out, there are parallels–learn from others, stick to your scope, and learn from the mistakes.

Zero Suicide - How Do We Get There?

The Zero Suicide initiative has been shown to significantly reduce suicides—and working toward zero suicides is our mission. Rachael Jasperson, Zero Suicide program manager, shares the framework for how we strive for this aspirational goal.

How to Solve Complex Problems

From the simple to the complex, problems plague our daily work. Quality Improvement experts Luca Boi and Ryan Murphy provide brief lessons and resources covering important problem solving techniques so you can develop solutions and make improvements.