What does it mean to take a system approach to problems? The discipline to learn as a team, patience to wade through hundreds of cases, and a diversity of perspectives. Utah’s Critical Care Senior Nursing Director Colleen Connelly, System Quality, Patient Safety, and Value Senior Director Sandi Gulbransen, and Associate Chief Medical Quality Officer Kencee Graves reflect on what they’ve learned by studying system problems with an interdisciplinary team.

Innovative teams solve problems by being curious, not by assigning blame. Environmental Services’ James Mwizerwa and Cooper Riley explain their deliberative approach to the long-standing and complex problem of getting inpatient rooms ready for the next patient.

Improvement isn’t just for one area of academic medicine. The right improvement can mean improved patient and trainee experience, reduced cost and a more engaged staff. Nurse Manager Bernice Tenort, physician Brett Einerson, and an interdisciplinary team ended up solving many challenges by tackling a long-standing problem: wait time in labor and delivery.

Value Week is a unique collaborative event that brings together U of U Health’s improvement community to recognize the important and impactful work conducted throughout our organization.

Chief Medical Quality Officer Bob Pendleton kicks off our week-long celebration of improvement and community during University of Utah Health Value Week.

Senior Value Engineer Luca Boi applies the Lean concept of waste to health care and explains how learning to see the “Seven Wastes” can help focus your efforts.

mEVAL is the system U of U Health uses to collect patient-reported outcomes (PROs). Of course, it’s what we do with the data that matters. mEVAL analytics team lead Josh Biber and cardiologist Josef Stehlik share how measuring PROs in the Cardiovascular Center is changing the ways clinicians treat and care for patients.

As the director of nursing at Huntsman Cancer Hospital, Sue Childress shares her passion for improvement with a team of hundreds of nurses and HCAs. Learn how a cape and hat inspired Childress’ nursing career, and a passion for cultivating innovation.

In 2011, Utah’s Intermediate Care Unit (IMCU) decided to improve patient safety through a new approach: engage the entire team in identifying and implementing the improvement. Clinical Operations Director Trell Inzunza shares the 4-step process that engaged the entire team to improve.

Scope is a powerful tool when changing practice. Rather than trying to revamp in one large swoop, scoping an improvement down to palatable stages can overcome resistance and lead to meaningful results for future improvement cycles. Although new improvers may feel this approach delays impact, repeated improvement cycles often lead to sustained care transformation. Dr. Theophilus Owan demonstrated this principle in his quest to improve value by standardizing anti-thrombotic medications given to patients undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI).

Medical errors often occur due to system failure, not human failure. Hospitalist Kencee Graves helps explain why we need to evaluate medical error from a system standpoint.

Including patients in treatment planning improves their experience, and patient reported outcomes (PROs) offer new ways to do just that — talking with patients about how treatment impacts their daily life. Clinical Nurse Coordinator Lisa McMurtrey shares the Burn Clinic team’s award-winning work implementing PROs during patient visits without disrupting flow.