Nursing & Midwifery News – December 2022

From Shane

I cannot think of any better way to close off 2022 than holding our Nursing & Midwifery Excellence Awards, which gives us a chance to celebrate our nurses and midwives. Collectively nurses and midwives are involved in all aspects of healthcare, and our actions have a momentous impact on the health outcomes and experience of our patients/women. The caliber of the nominations received this year has been nothing short of inspirational, and I cannot wait until I can share these with you! We will be showcasing the incredible achievements and contributions of our nurses and midwives at the award ceremony that is being held on Thursday 15 December 2022 at 2-4pm in the Auditorium (WCHRE Sunshine). Please join us if you can. If you cannot be there in person, please join us via Zoom.

During 2022 our professions have consistently excelled in meeting the healthcare needs of our community and we have cared for each other, supported our colleagues and have continued to be an astonishing team. Managing the ebbs and flows of living with COVID, whilst resuming the full gamut of our services has been challenging; particularly with unrelenting demand and the staff shortages being experienced across the health sector. However, we have risen above these obstacles, and collectively and individually you have been remarkable. You should feel immensely and rightfully proud of everything we have been able to achieve together, including:

• Been recognised for our significant improvement in preventing OVA via a Victorian Public Healthcare Award and a Worksafe Award
• Completed and started implementing the Nursing & Midwifery Workforce Plan 2022-2026
• Continued the implementation our Falls Improvement Plan
• Continued the implementation of the Maternity CARES Improvement Plan
• Significantly grown our post-graduate Midwifery employment program
• Completed Detailed Design for the New Footscray Hospital
• Delivered the first year of our 2 year Grad+ program, including 2 free post graduate subjects
• Increased our post-graduate nursing participation rates from around 60 per annum to 132. This will be up to 180 in 2023!
• Introduce the Transition to Acute Care program, employing over 30 new colleagues
• Embedded the RUSON and RUSOM roles to support our nurses and midwives, making these roles a permanent part of our workforce
• Attracted the most research grants ever for nursing and midwifery, undertook a record amount of nursing and midwifery led research, and published a record number of articles
• Submitted a phenomenal 6 nurse/midwife-led NHMRC research applications
• Expanded the Sunshine Hospital Emergency Department
• Continued the Phase 2.1 EMR project, completing user acceptance testing ahead of the mid-2023 go-live
• Completed most elements of integration of Bacchus Marsh and Melton
• Wrapped up COVID vaccination to the West, having delivered over 1.4M doses to the community
• Extensively consulted, developed and released our new Aboriginal Health Cultural Safety Plan for 2022-2025
• Completed the implementation of the new Nurses and Midwives enterprise agreement
• Commenced the new Melton Hospital project
• Continued a significant number of capital projects, including the new Footscray Hospital, Point Cook Community Hospital, Sunbury Community Hospital and the new Mental Health beds at Sunshine Hospital.

I sincerely thank you all for your hard work and commitment to deliver outstanding care to our patients through the year – each of you has been phenomenal!

I wish you and your families a very happy and safe festive season. For those of you that have well deserved leave, rest up, take time to recover and enjoy the time with your loved ones. For those of you that are working through the festive season to care for our patients, my sincere thanks and genuine appreciation.

I look forward to working with you all in 2023.

Shane Crowe
Executive Director, Nursing & Midwifery

Nursing & Midwifery Excellence Awards 2022

Please join us on Thursday 15 December 2022 at 2-4pm in the Auditorium (WCHRE Sunshine) and via Zoom for a catered event to celebrate the Nursing & Midwifery Excellence Awards.  The awards recognise excellence in nursing/midwifery practice and supporting the Best Care vision at Western Health, and we have received a large number of nominations celebrating the accomplishments of our Registered Nurses, Enrolled Nurses & Midwives.

Being presented at this function are awards for:

• Nurse or Midwife of the Year – recognising clinical excellence in nursing and/or midwifery practice, effective communication, and putting patients/women first when making decisions. A team player, with a commitment to looking for ways to do things better; contributing to the development of others and actively contributing to a culture of safety.
• Nursing or Midwifery Team of the Year – recognising a team that is committed to delivering excellent care to our patients/women, through effective communication, and demonstrated patient-centred care. A team that demonstrates they are constantly looking for ways to do things better; contributing to the development of all members of the team and has an active focus on Best Care and patient safety.
• Nursing / Midwifery Legend – recognising a staff member nearing retirement or recently retired whose career has significantly enhanced the nursing or midwifery professions, has led changes that improved care delivery and considered by their peers as a nursing/midwifery clinical leader focused on improving the consumer experience.
• Nursing / Midwifery Leadership – recognising a leader that demonstrates an innovative approach that contributes to the improvement delivery of quality care, a commitment to the professional development of self and others, utilises leadership, influence and research to enhance patient care, influences a positive culture within their work environment and identifies areas requiring improvement and has actively lead and facilitated change.

Recipients will be shared in a special edition of the Nursing & Midwifery News after the event.

Sleigh bells ringing

The Nursing and Midwifery Directorate would like to call for entries in the Department Christmas Decoration competition.

All departments are invited to take part in the competition by providing photo or video submissions!!

Prizes:

1st Prize: $500
2nd Prize: $200
3rd Prize: $100

To enter:

To enter please complete the following entry form and send to kellie-tyson@wh.org.au by 5pm, 9th December 2022

Winners Announced:

15th December 2022

Criteria for Judging:

• Relevance to Christmas
• Creativity
• Theme
• Involvement of Patients
• Incorporation of Best Care into the decorations
• Sustainability

Rules:

• Please do not place yourself or others at risk when hanging decorations.
• Decorations or items used for the fixation of decorations must not cause any damage to hospital buildings or property. It is recommended that Blu-tac or items from the 3M Command Adhesive range (or similar products) be used to fixate decorations.
• Upon completion of the Christmas season all decorations and fixations must be completely removed.
• Emergency equipment must be kept free of decoration, fire doors, fire detectors, fire / smoke detectors, fire hoses etc.
• Decorations must not be placed in front, beside or over any air scrubbers, air inlets and outlets.
• Decorations must be kept away from high risk areas within the zones, including donning and doffing areas.
• For COVID streaming zones, decorations should be cleanable and a ‘less is more’ approach within a single area of the department is encouraged.
• To avoid any fire hazards and power overloading wards are not to include decorations which require a power source (this unfortunately includes lights).
• Judges decision is final. No correspondence will be entered into.

Dashboards Going Live

We know that at the moment a lot of valuable staff time is expended on manual reporting. This can lead to inconsistencies in data visualisation across the organisation, and also limit the available time for staff to use this data to develop actions to improve.

Over the past 8 months significant consultation and work has been undertaken to plan, develop and refine new dashboards to alleviate these issues. We have also upgraded to the latest, high-specification version of PowerBI to ensure that we have increased functionality and flexibility in how we can report.

13 new Western Health Dashboards are being initially released between 12-16 December to help consolidate, simplify, and visualise the reporting functionality through a new, improved Power BI Service. The 13 new dashboards are:

1. Access & Flow overview
2. Access & Flow – Emergency Department
3. Quality & Safety – Clinical Incidents (Overview)
4. Quality & Safety – Severe Incidents
5. Quality & Safety – Overview
6. Quality & Safety – Best Care (Person Centered Care)
7. Quality & Safety – Best Care (Coordinated Care)
8. Quality & Safety – Best Care (Right Care)
9. Quality & Safety – Best Care (Safe Care)
10. Quality & Safety – Medication safety (pictured right)
11. Quality & Safety – Comprehensive Care – Nutrition
12. Finance – NWAU reporting
13. People & Culture – Employee Management & Development

There will be activities and sessions throughout the week to support the launch of the new dashboards, including 30 minute sessions for each new dashboard which is designed to introduce the dashboard purpose, undertake a ‘walk-through’ of the dashboard’s functionality and allow time for questions.

Additional dashboards are also in development and will be released and added to PowerBI once finalised. A total of 48 dashboards will be eventually released.

Free Nursing & Midwifery Study

Western Health is finalising our submissions for scholarships and training support for our nurses and midwives that are planning to undertake study in 2023.

The packages include:

• Enrolled Nurse to Registered Nurse
  102 of our Enrolled Nurses have expressed in a scholarship to undertake a transition/conversion ‘diploma to degree’ course. We are looking at the eligibility of each person and will put forward applications for those eligible and look at options for those that aren’t eligible. 
  
• Refresher Programs
  Western Health plans to run 2 Refresher programs in 2023, each with 50 participants. The programs are planned for April and June 2023, and will be a 12 week program, with a number of supernumerary weeks and the capacity to be able to exit the program at 8 weeks if deemed independently competent. The program is designed for nurses and midwives who are currently registered but who lack recency of practice.
• Postgraduate scholarships
  Next year Western health will have over 180 nurses and midwives participating in our post-graduate programs. This is a 300% increase on a few years ago!! The programs of study are wide and varied, including emergency, critical acre, cardiac, peri-operative, midwifery, paediatrics, neonatal intensive care, renal, cancer and acute care.  Funding for post-graduate scholarships will increase in both the number and value of scholarships provided to nurses and midwives undertaking postgraduate studies in 2023 and 2024. This will contribute to building capability in the nursing and midwifery workforce. It is not too late to study in 2023 if you would like to. To be eligible for these full scholarships you need to enrol in one of Western Health’s post-graduate clinical programs prior to the census date in early 2023.
• Support for new Nurse Practitioners
  There has been significant interest in growing the number of Nurse Practitioner roles across Western Health. After working with our Divisions, we are submitting for scholarship funding to support 4 new Nurse Practitioner roles in cardiac, othopeadics, critical care outreach and GEM@Home. Additionally we are submitting to funding to support a number of new Nurse Practitioner Candidate positions, in colorectal, upper GI, renal, paediatric diabetes, dementia, gerontology, oncology, palliative care and neonatal. There are a limited number of scholarships available, so we are hopeful that some of these submissions will be successful.

Working with our nurses and midwives to reform rostering

Western Health is working with Safer Care Victoria (SCV), the Department of Health (DH), the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (ANMF) to work with our nurses and midwives to implement an employee centred rostering project. Western Health is one of 3 health services involved in this important project, which aims to address flexibility by creating a set of guidelines that will support more employee centered rostering.

We are committed to working with our front-line nurses and midwives to develop a set of contemporary employee centred roster principles and guidelines that best meet your needs.

The project will address the changing environment nurses and midwives are currently experiencing including the need for flexibility regarding work arrangements, shift allocation, night duty rostering and the importance of professional ongoing development.

The research will involve:

• A detailed preliminary survey
• Multiple co-designed focus groups and workshops to develop the guidelines
• A second survey to ascertain the developed guidelines are suitable and acceptable
• Follow up surveys at six- and twelve-months duration following the introduction of the principles and guidelines to determine how well they are working for nurses, midwives, and health services.

Our aim is to use this data to drive improvement in rosters to formulate rostering principles and guidelines for the nursing and midwifery workforce across Victoria.

Doug Mill (Director of Nursing & Midwifery) is overseeing this project, and a Project Officer is is being recruited to support this important work. Keep an eye out, as it will be commencing early in 2023.

Pressure Injury Prevention Expo

It was fantastic to see so many of our staff attend the Western Health Pressure Injury Prevention Expo in late November. With representatives and equipment/product displays from Pegasus, Rehab Hire, Molnlycke, KCI, Hartmann, Podiatry, Nutrition, Stryker and our Clinical Equipment Library, there were plenty of opportunities to learn more about Pressure Injury Prevention and Management.

The Pressure Injury Prevention Expo team distributed loads of goodies, including our new Western Health Foot Check Cards and #Stop the Pressure t-shirts to participating staff. With heel and toe Hospital Acquired Pressure Injuries (HAPI) on the rise, it was a timely focus on foot pressure injury prevention.

We look forward to seeing our staff wearing the t-shirts at work. They are a great conversation starter with patients and families, and create opportunities for staff to educate their patients on how they can reduce their risk of pressure injury.

Special thanks to the Pressure Injury Prevention Expo team for organising this week long extravaganza, and the industry partners who donated their time and energy to support the campaign.

To our newly trained Pressure Injury Prevention Champions, thank you! You play an important role in improving our patient outcomes.

Please continue to promote patient heel elevation, bed cradles, regular foot checks,  pressure care, and targeted patient education in your respective areas. Remember, every conversation counts!

Nurse and Midwife Initiated Medication procedure updated

Following extensive consultation and review, the Nurse and Midwife Initiated Medication procedure has been updated to align processes at all Western Health sites. The updated PPG can be found on Prompt.

All Nurses and Midwives who administer medications are required to familiarise themselves with these changes. Changes to the Medication Administration record in EMR went live on Monday 21 November.

Please follow this link to view the full list.

Moving to one Western Health Riskman

The Go-Live date for the Bacchus Marsh and Melton (BMM) Riskman system to be integrated with the one Western Health Riskman system is Thursday 1 December 2022. This change will enable all clinical and feedback incidents to be entered into the one system.

There have been 5 new sites added to the Riskman system to incorporate the BMM sites:

• Bacchus Marsh & Melton Regional Hospital
• Caroline Springs Community Health Centre
• Grant Lodge Residential Aged Care
• Melton Community Services
• Melton Health Hub

BMM staff requiring to add incidents will notice that 5 BMM sites have been added to WH Riskman.

Due to BMM using a separate Patient Administration System to allocate UR numbers, a ‘BMM’ prefix will be added to the UR entered into the Client ID/MRN field. The system will add the prefix once a user has selected any of the 5 sites listed above.

This will ensure we can clearly distinguish between a Western Health URN and a BMM URN.

BMM staff only need to be aware of the prefix being added, noting they do not need to alter this or change this in anyway.

Staff can access Western Health’s Riskman system via Okta or BMM intranet page. Staff can continue using their existing @djhs email address to log in to Okta.

Existing BMM Riskman users will still be able to access the BMM Riskman, to ensure any incidents entered prior to 1 December that require follow up, investigation or closure can be accessed. No new incidents can be entered as of 1 December 2022.

Self Care Packages donated to our Sunshine Emergency Department team

In November of 2021, Jessie Rigby an artist based in the Macedon Ranges lost a dear friend Stacey, who had been an emergency nurse at Sunshine Hospital for 15 years.

After saying goodbye at a deeply emotional funeral service, Jessie was inspired to create an artwork in Stacey’s memory. She knew that the funds generated from the sale of the artwork should go to showing heart-felt gratitude to frontline healthcare workers.

Jessie and 18 other creative artists generously donated artworks in support of emergency self care. Together they raised over $10,000 for frontline health care workers. In addition, she was able to have some amazing businesses support the initiative including Endota Spa, iPantry and the Dinner Ladies to name a few.

Earlier this week Shane Crowe (EDONM) was lucky enough to assist EMA Divisional Director Patriece Shelly in delivering these generous gifts to the ED Unit Manager Louise Cooke and the ED nursing staff at Sunshine Hospital and pass on Jessie’s story and message:

“You have one of the most high-pressure jobs on the planet, and over the last few years that pressure has increased beyond belief and does not seem to show any signs of easing up. We want to make it easier for you to take some time out for a massage. To put your feet up with a decadent cuppa. To put a meal on your table after another killer night shift. To nourish your skin, ravaged by years of constant PPE use. These self care products have been carefully selected as our way to say Thank you!”.

Our thanks to Jessie, and all the people and companies that contributed to these generous self care hampers. Their selfless work and recognition of our incredible ED staff is inspiring.

New Stillbirth Standard to reduce the pain and silence

Stillbirth is a tragic and profound experience that affects more than 2,000 families in Australia every year. In Australia, of approximately 820 births, six babies are stillborn every day. Stillbirth is defined as the birth of a baby without signs of life, at 20 or more completed weeks of gestation or at a weight of 400 grams or more.

On 4 November 2022 the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care has released the first national Stillbirth Clinical Care Standard.

This clinical care standard aims to reduce unwarranted variation and improve the appropriateness of care for stillbirth prevention, and the quality of bereavement care following perinatal loss. The standard also supports the delivery of evidence-based clinical care, and promote shared decision making between patients, carers and clinicians.

The Stillbirth Clinical Care Standard includes:

• Ten quality statements describing the care that should be provided
• A set of indicators to support monitoring and quality improvement

Information and resources are available for consumers, clinicians, and healthcare services or you can download the full clinical care standard.

Best Care Awards 2022 recipients

Auditing Best Care results

At Western Health, our vision for outstanding patient care is that each of our patients receive ‘Best Care’ from us, every time, everywhere. To see how we are going, Auditing Best Care (ABC) was undertaken on 8 November 2022 and the key overarching finding were:

Communicating for Safety:

• 98% of patients were wearing correct and legible identification band(s)
• Over 90% of our patients recalled the nurse or midwife caring for them introducing themselves by name
• 61% of patients recalled the staff caring for them completing a handover at their bedside, with 72% of those patients feeling included and involved in that handover
• 94% of patients were able to reach their call bell
• 85% of patients recalled having their identity checked and wrist band scanned before they received medication
• 94% of patients recalled having their identity checked before receiving treatment or a procedure
• 57% of our patients had documented confirmation of their identification each shift
• 87% of our patients had evidence the COVID screening tool was completed on admission to hospital

Comprehensive Care:

• 80% of our patients had evidence of a fully completed Falls Risk Assessment within 4 hours of admission to the ward/unit, with 72% of our patients had evidence of a further 2 reviews of the falls risk assessment every 24 hours
• 85% of our patients had documented evidence in the EMR (or paper if not documented in EMR) that the falls prevention strategies have been implemented specific to the patient’s risk factors
• 82% of our patients had evidence in the EMR (or paper if not documented in EMR) of a fully completed skin assessment within 4 hours of admission to the ward/unit
• 91% of patients using a walking aid had it within reach
• 84% of our patients had evidence of a minimum of two full skin assessments completed every 24 hours
• 59% of our patients had documented evidence of pressure injury prevention interventions in place
• 53% of patients were dressed in day clothes
• 62% of our patients had evidence that the patient was weighed within 24 hours of admission toward
• 68% of our patients had a fully completed malnutrition assessment within 4 hours of admission toward
• 84% of our patients had documented evidence they were assessed for risk of a behavior of concern (BOC) within 24hours of admission to ward – with 5% of those patients identified as being at risk for behaviours of concern
• 60% of our patients had evidence of a Restrictive Practices Risk Assessment being completed within 4hours of admission to the ward – with less than 1% of our patient requiring restraint to be used
• 76% of our patients had documented evidence on the Patient Health Questionnaire-2 (PHQ-2) measuring their risk of self-harm or suicide was assessed within 24 hours of admission to ward
• 66% of our patients had evidence of a fully completed cognitive screen and 4AT within 4 hours of admission to the ward/unit
• If there was a change in behaviour and thinking, only 12% of patients had a 4AT completed.

Well done to our teams for the good results, however there are some opportunities for improvement. Results will be shared with clinical areas, and then improvement plans can be put in place ahead of the next ABC Day in 6 months time.

Best Care Excellence & Improvement Project Launching 5th December 2022

Western Health in partnership with VMIA are creating the Best Care Excellence & Improvement Project. The project aims to demonstrate how each staff member is a fundamental contributor to creating a culture of continuous improvement and driving the responsibility for improvement and change to every staff member.

7 interactive We-Learn modules will include facilitating and teaching skills in improvement, innovation, and the role of ‘human factors’ in healthcare errors, including Safety I and Safety II.

The learning modules will be released in a phased approach which will include

1. Live Best Care Module
2. Patient Experience and Engagement
3. Effective communication, Staff Engagement and Empowerment
4. Risk Identification, Incident Management and Open Disclosure
5. Clinical Practice Improvement, Project Management and Clinical Innovation
6. Clinical Informatics, Systems Thinking, Process Improvement and Change Management
7. Data Analysis and Application

Look out for us during our launch week starting the 05/12/2022, the team will be showcasing the project through information stalls across Western Health

• 05/12 Monday Footscray
• 06/12 Tuesday Sunshine & JKWC
• 07/12 Wednesday Footscray
• 08/12 Thursday Sunshine & JKWC
• 09/12 Friday Williamstown

There will also be 2 zoom drop-in session for those unable to attend the stalls

• 05/12 Monday 2pm – 3pm
• 08/12 Thursday 2pm – 3pm

For more information visit the Live Best Care site Best Care Excellence & Improvement Project – Live Best Care (wh.org.au)

Prompt now live

The Prompt system for policies, procedures and guidelines (PPGs) recently went live for all Western Health staff. Click here to access the new Western Health Prompt system, and there is also a tile that links to the site down the bottom of the Nursing & Midwifery microsite.

Prompt supports a significant number of health services with their PPG access and management requirements, and has a well-developed search function which should make it easier for staff to find and utilise PPGs. Click here to view a short video (less than 3 minutes) on using Prompt.

All of the PPGs previously on the Intranet have been copied and moved across to Prompt. PPG management processes will now be the same for all Western Health services, including Bacchus Marsh & Melton. Coloured banners on PPGs to clarify the scope of their use and a more advanced search function are a couple of features introduced to support integration of these processes.

For further information on PPG management processes, please refer to the Western Health procedure on ‘Policy and Procedure/Guideline Framework – Operation’

A new email address has been created for the submission of all PPGs or queries about PPG management processes: documents@wh.org.au. Please also use this email if you have any queries about using the new PROMPT system.

Aboriginal Cultural Safety Plan launched

Western Health was delighted to officially launch our Aboriginal Cultural Safety Plan 2022-2025 on 17 November 2022 at Sunshine Hospital.

We were joined by Wurundjeri Gunnai Kurnai Elder Uncle Ringo who performed a Welcome to Country and smoking ceremony before the plan was introduced by our Wilim Berrbang (Aboriginal Health) Team.

Actions outlined in the plan will help us as a health service contribute to closing the gap through a range of initiatives that improve the health and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

The new four-year plan focuses on building a culturally-capable workforce; ensuring healthcare systems are responsive to Aboriginal people’s cultural knowledge, beliefs and values; supporting a well-resourced Indigenous health workforce; and creating physically welcoming spaces.

Tanya Druce, who steered the development of the plan in her previous role as the Manager of Wilim Berrbang with Indigenous-owned Karabena Consulting, said “Our overarching aim is to ensure Aboriginal people feel welcome and safe at Western Health, whether they are patients, staff or volunteers; they should have an experience free from racism, preconceived ideas and be accepted for who they are.”

Executive Director Nursing and Midwifery Shane Crowe said for the first time Western Health has combined its employment and cultural safety plans on the basis that cultural safety is a shared responsibility across the organisation. “The new plan ensures Western Health continues to make progress towards overcoming the inequality experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and achieve life outcomes equal to all Australians.”

Recently, Western Health has made significant headway, celebrating a series of firsts. This includes:

To read more about the plan, head to our internet site.

EMR Phase 2.1 User Acceptance Testing

Nurses and midwives from across the organisation played an active role in important EMR Phase 2.1 testing recently, visiting the specialised testing space at the Western Health Braybrook Corporate Campus to put the enhanced EMR system through its paces. This important stage of the EMR Phase 2.1 project involved key clinical and clerical representatives walking through mock patient scenarios in the new EMR modules to ensure they are operating as expected to support the workflows of our clinicians and administration staff when implemented in 2023.

As well as performing the important testing requirements, this testing period gave nurses and midwives a chance to explore the new EMR system and provide feedback to the EMR Phase 2.1 project team.

• “I’ve seen nothing but benefits. There are definitely some challenges, but I do think it’s going to be nothing but improvements for the department and the hospital. Communication between all the multi-disciplinary health teams will be the best, and I just see improved patient safety with that improved communication and not chasing people around the department.” – Laura, Emergency Department Nurse
•  “I think one of the exciting factors is how we can collaborate more carefully with our other units. So having patients come from Theatre or the ED, we can then see how that transparency of information and that clarity of what’s happened prior to or after the care they’ve received from us. That’s a great thing for patient safety.” – Paula, ICU Nurse
• “I think it (the EMR) will be more cohesive and allow everyone to work better together for the patient. Having a single system will make a big difference and make everyone’s workflows much easier. It will take some getting used to, but once it’s in and everyone’s familiar with it I think it will be a good change.” – Stephanie, Theatre Nurse

A short video on this testing event and feedback from a variety of staff is available here.

The EMR Phase 2.1 project team wish to pass on their immense gratitude to all the nurses and midwives who contributed their time and expertise to help make this round of testing such a success.

For more information on the EMR Phase 2.1 project, please visit the Digital Health information site.

Digital Learning Health System Academy scholarships

The University of Melbourne Centre for Digital Transformation Health, of which Western Health is a partner, is offering scholarships to support clinicians to participate in the 2023 Learning Health System (LHS) Academy (Learning Health System Academy (unimelb.edu.au)).

The LHS Academy is a professional development program for clinicians to learn and implement data-driven and digital health-enabled clinical practice improvement.

It requires two days a week, onsite and virtual, from February to December 2023, and is comprised of the following components:

• Targeted active learning course-work to build the competencies required for Fellows of the Academy to contribute to the digital transformation of healthcare
• Project-based learning to provide Fellows with hands on experience in using health data to inform clinical practice and in digital health-enabled models of care.

Up to two scholarships are available for Western Health staff. One scholarship will be to support a project leveraging the existing Western Health Perpetual fund project (see attached project outline, and contact Chris Lemoh ( Christopher.Lemoh@wh.org.au ) to discuss project ideas), and the other for a novel project to be proposed as part of the EOI application.

The proposed project needs to benefit Western Health (but could involve other institutions) and focus on one of the following areas:

• analysing routinely-collected healthcare data to understand unwarranted variation in care. Settings for projects within this scope could include (but are not limited to) inpatients, outpatients, specialist clinics or shared care
• designing digital health tools for virtual care. Settings for projects within this scope could include (but are not limited to) Hospital in the Home or home monitoring.

Your participation and the project need evidence of Western Health support e.g. from Director or Operations Manager, including a plan for how the project could be integrated into Western Health activities.

• Executive sponsorship will be facilitated for the successful applicant/s, with the University of Melbourne providing infrastructure and data analytics expertise.

To apply, please complete the EOI form, that requires an explanation of your career interest in digital health and a high-level overview of your proposed project, to assess its need, applicability, and feasibility.

The final date for submissions is Friday 9 December 2022. Applications will be shortlisted, with interviews to be conducted prior to the 23 December.

For further information please contact Dr Oliver Daly (Chief Medical Informatics Officer).

Inaugural Director of Nursing for Mental Health & Wellbeing

As the mental health service transition and integration program of work builds momentum, recruitment will be commencing shortly of some key roles within the project team.

The new team will join our Director, Transition and Integration Paula Stephenson in undertaking this exciting program of work to welcome staff, consumers and services to Western Health from the beginning of July 2023.

Of note is the recruitment to the inaugural Director of Nursing Mental Health & Wellbeing role. The successful candidate will initially join Paula in the project team to establish the role and provide vital expertise as the clinical lead. When services and staff transition, the Director of Nursing Mental Health & Wellbeing will assume the lead professional nursing role of our Mental Health and Wellbeing Service reporting to Shane Crowe, Executive Director Nursing and Midwifery.

Challenge the way you think about disability

The International Day of People with Disability (IDPwD) will be celebrated on 3 December. IDPwD is a United Nations sanctioned day that is celebrated around the world since 1992. The day aims to increase public awareness, understanding and acceptance of people with disability and celebrate their achievements and contributions.

Program takes out Award for Excellence in Indigenous Engagement

The Baggarrook Yurrongi program, which revealed that maternity care for First Nations mothers and babies can be improved through access to culturally safe continuity of midwifery care, won the Award for Excellence in Indigenous Engagement.

The project was led by Latrobe University in partnership with Western Health via our Galinjera program, the Victorian Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation (VACCHO), the Royal Women’s Hospital and the Mercy Hospital for Women.

As part of the project, continuity of midwifery care was offered to women having a First Nations baby, with remarkable program uptake. Over 700 women having a First Nations baby received the innovative program, compared with only 34 prior to the study.

Continuity of midwifery care, or ‘caseload midwifery’, is where women have a known midwife care for them throughout their pregnancy, labour, birth and in the early postnatal period.

The caseload midwifery model offers a collaborative and coordinated approach, providing First Nations women the opportunity to have a known midwife who has appropriate cultural training to help them navigate their journey through the maternity care system, while maintaining their community and family supports.

The study showed very high levels of satisfaction for women having a First Nations baby. Across pregnancy, labour, birth and the early postnatal period, women reported very positive experiences of care – which was often very different to their previous maternity care experiences.

Benchmarking Best Care

The latest benchmark reports from the Health Roundtable that go up to June 2022 have recently been released, that show how our delivery of Best Care compares to other health services across Australasia.

Let’s look at how we perform in the area of hospital acquired infections. Hospital acquired infections include urinary tract infections, surgical site infection, pneumonia, blood stream infection, central line and peripheral line associated bloodstream infection, multi-resistant organisms, infection associated with prosthetics/implantable devices, gastrointestinal infections and other high impact infections.

Hospital Acquired Infections:

Sunshine Hospital

The rates of hospital acquired infections at Sunshine Hospital is now in the green and has been trending downwards.

Well done to our Sunshine Hospital teams.

This means that our patients get far less hospital acquired infections that we do at peer hospitals. This is a wonderful result.

Footscray Hospital

Rates of hospital acquired infections at Footscray Hospital remains in the amber zone, but only just with a significant spike upwards in the 2 quarters.

We are right in the middle of our peers, which means that our outcomes are acceptable, but there are opportunities for improvement.

We will need to keep an eye on the latest spike to ensure this comes down again.

Bacchus Marsh Hospital:

The rate of healthcare associate infections has been decreasing significantly since Western Health joined up Bacchus Marsh Hospital to the Health Roundtable.

We are now well and truly in the green, and well below most of our peers. Fantastic work by all of our colleagues at Bacchus Marsh!

Remember, you can impact these results through:

• Gloves should always be clean: gloves should always be changed between patients, and clean gloves are always required when undertaking any procedure. Hand hygiene is required between changes of gloves, and alcoholic hand rub must never be applied to gloves.
• Hand Hygiene: ensure you undertake the 5 moments of hand hygiene and that there is alcoholic hand rub present at every bed side and point of care.
• Correct skin preparation: whenever an invasive device is being inserted, chlorhexidine skin preparation must be utilised. An alcohol wipe is never an appropriate skin preparation.
• Antiseptic non-touch technique (ANTT): when inserting, accessing, dressing or removing any invasive device, ANTT needs to be utilised. Also please ensure that you use a clean stainless steel dressing trolley, not a kidney dish, bedside table or the patient’s bed.
• Only insert a device if it is needed: Always ‘hesitate before you cannulate’. Does the patient really need that device inserted? Never insert a device ‘just in case’. Any invasive device is a potential source of infection, so let’s minimise them where we can.
• Remove the device as soon as it is not needed: As soon as a device is no longer needed, remove it as quickly as possible. Ask medical staff to change IV orders to oral orders where appropriate. The longer devices are in situ, the greater the risk of an infection occurring.

Upcoming Education Opportunities

Check out WeLearn for the upcoming educational opportunities available for Western Health nurses and midwives:

• Invasive Lines & Cannulation:
  Due to COVID-19 restrictions, advertised dates are only available for Bank-Pool Nursing Staff, Radiology and Medical staff. All ward nursing staff are to book in a time with their ward educator.
• Resuscitation Mandatory Competencies:
  Sessions have recommenced. In the first instance, can you arrange an assessment with your local instructor or educator. Resus educators are contacting managers to arrange local sessions for individual teams. Dedicated sessions for Bank and Pool Staff along with separate sessions for Nursing and Medical staff are available on WeLearn.

December 2022:

• 02/12/2022: Crisis Management in Obstetric Anaesthesia and Neonatal Resuscitation (CMOANR)
• 07/12/2022: Night Duty: Falls / Introduction to Lippincott
• 12/12/2022: Refugee and Asylum Seeker Study Day: Sunshine Hospital (Enrolments opening soon!)

Emerging evidence

The Western Health Library Service is a great source for locating the latest nursing and midwifery related evidence based practice and research.

Latest articles of interest:

• Proactive rounding: Perspectives and experiences of nurses and midwives working in a large metropolitan hospital. Australian Critical Care, 2022: November. Full Text  Western Health Author
• Predictors and impact of women’s breastfeeding self-efficacy and postnatal care in the context of a pandemic in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand. Midwifery, 2022: November.  Full Text  Western Health Author
• Nurse- and midwife-led trials in Australia and New Zealand: Scoping review protocol. Collegian, 2022: October. Full Text
• Maternal mental health: Women’s voices and data from across the globe. BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth, 2022 October. Full Text  Western Health Author
• Towards the idea of ‘clinical capital’: A longitudinal study exploring nurses’ dispositions and workplace manifestations in an Australian intensive care unit. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 2022: November. Full Text
• Individualized Risk Prediction for Improved Chronic Wound Management. Advances in Wound Care, 2022: November. Full Text

New Nursing/Midwifery eBook Title

• Experiences of health workers in the COVID-19 pandemic: in their own words. Routledge, 2022.
  Experiences of Health Workers in the COVID-19 Pandemic shares the stories of frontline health workers – told in their own words – during the second wave of COVID-19 in Australia. The book records the complex emotions health workers experienced as the pandemic unfolded and the challenges they faced in caring for themselves, their families, and their patients. The book shares their insights on what we can learn from the pandemic to strengthen our health system and prepare for future crises. The book draws on over 9,000 responses to a survey examining the psychological, occupational, and social impact of COVID-19 on frontline health workers. Survey participants came from all areas of the health sector, from intensive care doctors to hospital cleaners to aged care nurses, and from large metropolitan hospitals to rural primary care practices.
  View similar Library titles available at Western Health
• Gerontological nursing: competencies for care 5^th edition. Jones & Bartlett, 2023
  Following the framework outlined by the AACN’s recommended baccalaureate competencies and curricular guidelines for the care of older adults, the text guides students through the core foundations of gerontological nursing as a specialty. The Fifth Edition emphasizes these essential competencies coupled with the management of geriatric syndromes that impact this population including falls, sleep disorders, depression/anxiety, and elder abuse. Key Features: * Practical information on dementia for nurses and caregivers * Expanded content on fall prevention * New content on COVID-19 and telehealth care * “Healthy Aging Tips” found throughout the text* Updated research highlights* Critical thinking and personal reflection exercises * Video case studies in the form of author-conducted interviews accessible via Navigate Premier Access.
  View similar Library titles available at Western Health

Off-site or home access to the library eBook titles and databases, require free library membership. If you are not a member you can Join Online. For more information Click on our FAQ page.  All the links above work best with Microsoft Edge.

Visit the library’s Intranet website, or ring the library to speak with a Librarian: 8395 8036 or 8345 6655. Working from home? Visit the Library Internet site.