“So what does it take to dramatically improve patient safety and service quality? It takes a host of new and different (and sometimes radical) methods centered on supporting the people on the front lines: those who actually take care of the patient. It takes a hospital like the one in this story: St. Michael’s. “St. Michael’s itself is fictional, but it is specifically designed to show how the ideal healthcare environment would look and feel. Are all the methods and ideas and organizational characteristics in use at St. Michael’s largely in use in real institutions? Not yet, though many are in the process of being adopted, and some are already producing wonderful results.
“But the bottom line is this: What St. Michael’s represents is an achievable paradigm, and if we can’t imagine what constitutes truly safe and collegial hospitals, we can’t build them.”
John J. Nance, JD
In Why Hospitals Should Fly by John J. Nance, JD, the 2009 James A. Hamilton ACHE Book of the Year, he advanced a paradigm—a model of what a good, successful, safe, and efficient hospital looks like. The name of the fictional hospital featured in that award-winning book could be stated in Naval terms as a class: A “St. Michael’s-class” hospital (like a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier). In this book, Charting the Course, written by John Nance, JD, and co-author, Kathleen Bartholomew, RN, MN, they address head-on the challenge of actually becoming a St. Michael’s-class institution by illuminating leadership’s role in changing the culture—and they do so by continuing from Why Hospitals Should Fly the personal and professional journey of Dr. Will Jenkins. His battle, and emerging wisdom born of tragedy, illuminates the norms of the current culture and illustrates why each member of every medical facility, regardless of rank, must be a leader and owner of the cultural revolution needed to keep our system viable and our patients safe. While the first book dealt more with the “why” of a cultural revolution, this sequel deals more with the “how” of changing an ingrained hospital culture. We hope you enjoy Charting the Course as much as you enjoyed Why Hospitals Should Fly.
Click here to download Will Jenkins' PowerPoint Presentation referenced in chapter 26 of Charting the Course.
“As physicians, we pride ourselves on our vast knowledge, skill, and experience base. Yet, as a profession, we’ve been ignorant–certainly I have been–that the most fundamental knowledge deficit of all is not knowing what you were unaware you even needed to know. Teamwork, for instance, was never taught, never practiced, and we never knew it was of any real value to medicine.”