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Friday, Mar 29, 2024

Hospital Adds Executive Position for Service Excellence

Jessica Vernabe At Valley Presbyterian Hospital, patient satisfaction is a serious matter – so serious that an employee with clinical experience will now be monitoring the ins and outs of the hospital’s service at an executive level. Jennifer Castaldo, the hospital’s former assistant chief nursing officer will begin working as the Van Nuys-based hospital’s vice president of service excellence on June 1, said Gustavo Valdespino, the hospital’s CEO. Castaldo soon will work with the hospital’s various department heads, including its new chief nursing officer, to oversee care and suggest new ideas for improvement, Valdespino said. “She’ll be out there on the floors. She’ll be visiting patients,” Valdespino said. “We’ll be doing a lot of training of the employees for best practices.” Another key role will be to monitor patient satisfaction scores, which the hospital’s administrators say are released for the public through Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. The scores reflect patients’ overall satisfaction and their likelihood of recommending the health care facility to others. “Right now we’re at about 70 percent on both of those (areas),” Valdespino said. The goal it to increase those ratings to between 80 and 85 percent over the next two or three years, he said. Castaldo will report directly to Jean Rico, the Valley Presbyterian Hospital’s senior vice president of quality. Rico said key areas of focus for Castaldo include nursing communications, communications about the medications patients will receive, pain management, cleanliness and quietness. “It’s really about the community that we serve and making sure that our patients want to come out here,” Rico said. The new role replaces a former director of patient relations position, which monitored some elements of customer satisfaction, Rico said. Castaldo’s past nursing experience gives her an edge in the new executive role, Valdespino said. “So much of our patients’ satisfaction comes from the interaction that the patient has with the nurses, and I think that’s where we have an opportunity to continue to improve,” he said. Creating the new position has been in the planning stages since Valdespino became CEO in 2009, he said. Filling the position was another step toward improving the hospital, after efforts to get the hospital in better financial shape, he said. “We’re starting to see strong financial performance, and we’re seeing our quality scores improve,” he said. “Now we’re going to take a major look and focus on our customer satisfaction scores. … I think more and more hospitals are moving toward this kind of position.” The position also focuses on improving satisfaction for employees, physicians and general hospital customers. Castaldo became assistant chief nursing officer at Valley Presbyterian Hospital last March. She has more than 10 years of nursing leadership experience at the hospital. Transition Care Company Gets Contract Partners at Home announced this month that it landed its first contract for its PASS program, which is designed to coordinate patients’ hospital-to-home transition of care. The company was established last year in a joint venture by San Fernando-based nonprofit organization Partners in Care Foundation and Miami-based Independent Living Systems. Inland Empire Health Plan signed a contract last month for Partners at Home’s PASS program, which stands for Post Acute Support Services program. The health plan has selected two hospitals in Colton and San Bernardino to use the program, said Edward Kim, Partners at Home’s executive director. The program uses nurses and the company’s Web-based information system to monitor and manage post-hospital care, Kim said. He said the nurses coordinate home appointments with patients starting at the bedside, meet them at their homes, use the PASS health questionnaires they access on iPads to determine patients’ needs, and set up home care management plans. The nurses, he said, identify home safety issues, coordinate with the patients or caregivers to ensure meal needs are met, and identify other accessibility issues. Partners at Home has three nurses and one support staff member working in the Inland Empire area, though Kim said that team could eventually grow. Kim said the program has generated interest from health plans and hospitals. “With all the cost pressures, hospitals are looking for ways (to keep) only the most appropriate patients in the hospital,” Kim said. “There is a way to prevent an admission by keeping the person healthy at home.” Seeking additional contracts, Partners at Home is in discussion with hospitals in several Southern California counties, Kim said. “We’re looking to securing five new contracts in the next six months,” he said. Staff Reporter Jessica Vernabe can be reached at (818) 316-3123 or at [email protected]

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