News Briefs

St. John’s Clinic Force for Good donates nearly $60,000 to children’s charities

St. John’s Clinic representatives presented checks totaling nearly $60,000 to CASA, The Child Advocacy Center, Phelps County Child Advocacy Network and CASA of South Central Missouri as a result of the Clinic Force for Good's “Will You Hold a Child’s Hand” campaign. More than $150,000 has been raised through this fund for area charities; nearly $12,000 raised in the Rolla area.
The money was raised by St. John’s Clinic’s Force for Good, an ongoing initiative that involves harnessing good will, resources and leadership to benefit those in need in the Ozarks. The Force for Good is a fund within St John’s Foundation for Community Health.
“Because of the generosity of our co-workers and physicians, 1,200 children will receive the helping hands they need through CASA and The Child Advocacy Center,” says St. John’s Clinic Senior Vice President Donn Sorensen.

St. John’s – St. Francis Hospital Laboratory receives national accreditation

By demonstrating compliance with the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organization’s national standards for health care quality and safety, St. John’s St. Francis Hospital Laboratory has earned the Joint Commission’s Gold Seal of Approval.
“We sought accreditation for our laboratory because we want to demonstrate our commitment to patient safety and quality care,” explained St. John’s St. Francis Hospital President Don Swafford. “We view this accreditation as another step toward continuing our excellence.”
The laboratory hosted one surveyor for two days in December 2004.
“The accreditation process helps promote continuous, systematic and organization-wide improvement in health care organizations,” says Joann Born, executive director, Laboratory Accreditation Program, Joint Commission. “Achieving accreditation demonstrates St. John’s St. Francis Laboratory’s commitment to providing high-quality and safe services.”

Financial planning expert to encourage Woman's Retreat attendees to 'get their house in order'

Organizing your final thoughts, wishes and assets – “getting your house in order” – in anticipation of death or illness is one of the greatest gifts you can give your family, according to Donna Pagano, a certified financial planner and the keynote speaker for St. John’s Totally Healthy Woman Retreat Nov. 11-13.
Pagano will speak about “Love Letters to Your Family,” a system that helps families “get their house in order” – financially and emotionally – before they die or become incapacitated.
“A family doesn’t have the time to grieve the way they need to if they’re too busy gathering paper work, tracking down assets and trying to figure out their loved one’s wishes for their estate,” Pagano says.
That’s why Pagano and her husband of 34 years “got their house in order” in            Donna Pagano
1990 and began writing what she calls “love letters” to their three now-grown
children. The letters, which eventually grew into journals, chronicle important events in their children’s lives and record the couple’s thoughts and feelings. The journals will be given to the Pagano children after their parents’ deaths.
Two years ago, the family had an “estate dinner” to discuss the Paganos’ wishes for how their estate will be handled.
“We didn’t discuss the particulars of our will at that dinner, but we wanted to get certain family issues out in the open,” Pagano says.
The system has worked so well for Pagano’s family that she began using it with her clients.

Team Trax Weightlifting takes top honors at Junior Olympic Games

Team Trax Weightlifting/Greater Springfield Community Olympic Development program won the girls 14-16 age group and the overall women's team title in the sport of weightlifting at the AAU Junior Olympic Games July 30-31, in New Orleans.
This is the first team title ever in weightlifting for the city and Team Trax weightlifting/Greater Springfield CODP. Team Trax trains at St. John’s HealthTracks Sports Training Center.
“We are an up-and-coming part of national weightlifting events,” says Coach Brandon Ezzell.                                              
In addition to being a USA Weightlifting affiliate, St. John’s            Katie Inmon
HealthTracks Sports Training Center’s weightlifting program
became an official Olympic training program when Springfield was named a Community Olympic Development Program (CODP) site in December 2003.
Springfield was selected as the host city of the USAW National School-Age Championships to take place in June 2007. Only five National Championships are sanctioned each year.

Mercy's Genesis Project gearing up for local implementation

St. John's and parent organization the Sisters of Mercy Health System are launching a system-wide initiative to improve patient care and business operations through information technology.
Mercy is investing an estimated $226 million on the four-year Genesis Project, which will redesign and improve clinical and business work processes and enhance information systems.
Possible improvements include allowing patients to register where they are being treated, instead of at a central check-in; allowing nurses to file patient information electronically, instead of filling out paperwork; allowing nurses, physicians and others to look up medical records electronically from a variety of places, including at a doctor's office; giving employees self-service access to vacation, compensation and benefits information; and improving bill paying and supply ordering.
Dedicated teams of co-workers and physicians will design, develop and deploy new work processes and technology that will support patient care and business needs across Mercy.
Two St. John's executives, President and CEO Kim Day and Senior Vice President Ronnie Brownsworth, M.D., are charged with implementing the Genesis Project for St. John’s. As complicated as the scope of such a large project can be, the focus remains very simple, according to Brownsworth.
“It’s really about ‘how do we deliver high-quality health care to our patients?,’" he says.

Greeters help St. John’s Hospital campus patients and visitors

St. John’s Hospital’s newly created Guest Services department is working hard to make the hospital campus a pleasant place to visit.
“Visiting a hospital as large as St. John’s that is also undergoing a major renovation can be pretty overwhelming for patients and visitors,” says Hospitality Representative Ron Adrian, a former pastor for Seminole Baptist Church. “For someone who is already nervous or upset about coming to the hospital, it can be especially frustrating to have to find a parking spot, make their way into the building and once they get there, figure out where they need to go.”
Twenty-six hospitality representatives stationed at the hospital and other campus facilities welcome visitors to the campus, assist them with directions, provide shuttle and tram transportation to and from the parking lots and assist with loading and unloading patients at facility entrances.
They can be found at building entrances and elevators and will soon have a new uniform – navy blue blazers and khaki pants.
Guest Services staff members now wear professional St. John’s shirts and khakis, but will be more recognizable in their new uniforms, says Chris Dodd, Guest Services director.
The staff and St. John’s Auxiliary work together to provide wheelchairs and/or an escort to patients who need them upon arrival. Auxiliary staff continue to staff the information desks at the main and east entrances of the hospital and provide patient room numbers and other information, Dodd says.
The Guest Services department contributes to other health system customer service efforts, says Julie Jones, vice president of St. John’s Marketing and Customer Service.
“Customer service at St. John’s, or ‘Mercy Service,’ as we call it, involves exceeding our customers' expectations by delivering the highest degree of clinical care and service,” Jones says “Providing this personal attention to our patients and visitors is just one way we can help them as our campus expands to meet the growing health care needs of our community.”
Adrian says the Guest Services staff take their posts – and the mission of St. John’s – quite seriously.
“Our jobs are much more than opening doors for people, although we do that too,” he says, chuckling. “Our staff is responsible for a patient or visitor’s first impression of St. John’s, and we take that responsibility to heart. I thoroughly enjoy interacting with patients and visitors and assuring them that they or their loved one will get only the best care here.”