When the kids were little there was a parenting strategy to get them to complete tasks quickly that involved setting a timer and letting the timer be the “bad guy” instead of the parent. It sounded ridiculous to me, that a kid would not be able to connect the person to the timer. But it mostly worked! I think this new dinner table conversation approach is very similar. There’s something empowering in them picking out their own question instead of me asking/interrogating them. All in all it made for a very pleasant meal.
I started my new job about 2 weeks ago. Shortly after which, the woman who is training me announced that she is leaving. So the person who was filling in on the QI duties is going to be gone at the end of March and the job has been vacant for some time. In steps this now well-rested resident, experienced in program management and interested in quality improvement, to help out. Serendipity. I honestly do not believe that the Universe navigates itself to provide these sorts of opportunities for people. The Universe is chaotic and random, and sometimes things just work out. Whether this opportunity is provided by the cold randomness of existence or because of The Secret & the “law of attraction” (insert eyeroll emoji here), I am grateful and engaged in doing the very best for the organization that I can while I’m here.
One of my recent tasks was looking over phone triage protocols for a new service we are starting that adds a layer of evaluation & support over the phone before patients get sent to the resident pager. In order for the nurses at the triage service to take the calls, we need to approve, add and amend protocols that they will use to address some simple concerns. I was able to review this with the clinical manager so that instead of asking a very busy attending to create it, she was able to take a proposal to them and ask for revisions/approval.
I’m also going to be running an every other week 90 minute meeting about quality improvement initiatives at our practice. I’ll write more later about why these QI measures are important to clinical care anc clinic operations. I just wanted to get started blogging about the new job and now it is time to get some sleep.
Children are like a gas - they will fill up any space you allow them to occupy. This is not a good or bad thing, it just is. My children have very quickly gotten used to having me around more. They are taking up more space; there are requests for things that they can very easily accomplish on their own (Can I have some milk? Will you go get my __?). Sometimes I oblige them, sometimes I make them do it themselves. Usually the former is met with appreciation, the latter with resignation. Also, they have lost the ability to get themselves up and out the door in the mornings. There is oversleeping, forgetting to set alarms (okay, I’m guilty of that one too), some unfortunate cases where the bus comes much earlier than expected. After a whole school year of up and at ‘em, they are now decidedly slacking. I’ve decided that is okay for now. I will wean them back to the harsh reality of getting their acts together when we are all ready for me to go back to work.
Some of the scariest moments of my life have been filled with worry about my children. Fortunately these days, mostly I’m feeling moments of joy, peace and an unclenching of my heart as my kids demonstrate resiliency and emotional fluency they are mastering in the process of recovering from the first real moments where their lives went sideways. Not that there haven’t been hardships in their lives, but the divorce and relocation were the first big “oh shit” moments they’ve experienced, where their lives unfolded in drastically unexpected ways. They’re both learning to deal with disappointment and not to let a bad moment ruin their entire day. They are better able to communicate their needs and are more open and loving people than the angry (albeit justifiably) and resentful people they were at the beginning of this big change. Bittersweet indeed that just as they develop these nuanced personalities, they are nearly done being my full-time responsibility. I swear, they were toddlers & preschoolers like 20 minutes ago, where has the time gone?!?
One of the dizzying things about this temporary job I’ve got is that it is squarely in the “other half” of the health care system from where I have been situated as a resident. Instead of seeing patients and learning clinical decision making, I’m dealing with a lot of administration, billing, health information management, insurance (private & public) and practice management issues. These are real and important issues and it is amazing how divorced they are from the day to day work of taking care of patients. We have a whole office of billing & HIM people who retrieve & send out records and submit and manage reimbursements. This is a very necessary part of the current structure of our delivery of health care. Granted, I think Medicare for all is the way to go, but DAMN there is going to be some serious unemployment that we will have to deal with if that ever were to become the way things work. There are so many middle men in medicine, I can’t even accurately convey the scope of it.
***************
I started my new job about 2 weeks ago. Shortly after which, the woman who is training me announced that she is leaving. So the person who was filling in on the QI duties is going to be gone at the end of March and the job has been vacant for some time. In steps this now well-rested resident, experienced in program management and interested in quality improvement, to help out. Serendipity. I honestly do not believe that the Universe navigates itself to provide these sorts of opportunities for people. The Universe is chaotic and random, and sometimes things just work out. Whether this opportunity is provided by the cold randomness of existence or because of The Secret & the “law of attraction” (insert eyeroll emoji here), I am grateful and engaged in doing the very best for the organization that I can while I’m here.
One of my recent tasks was looking over phone triage protocols for a new service we are starting that adds a layer of evaluation & support over the phone before patients get sent to the resident pager. In order for the nurses at the triage service to take the calls, we need to approve, add and amend protocols that they will use to address some simple concerns. I was able to review this with the clinical manager so that instead of asking a very busy attending to create it, she was able to take a proposal to them and ask for revisions/approval.
I’m also going to be running an every other week 90 minute meeting about quality improvement initiatives at our practice. I’ll write more later about why these QI measures are important to clinical care anc clinic operations. I just wanted to get started blogging about the new job and now it is time to get some sleep.
***************
Children are like a gas - they will fill up any space you allow them to occupy. This is not a good or bad thing, it just is. My children have very quickly gotten used to having me around more. They are taking up more space; there are requests for things that they can very easily accomplish on their own (Can I have some milk? Will you go get my __?). Sometimes I oblige them, sometimes I make them do it themselves. Usually the former is met with appreciation, the latter with resignation. Also, they have lost the ability to get themselves up and out the door in the mornings. There is oversleeping, forgetting to set alarms (okay, I’m guilty of that one too), some unfortunate cases where the bus comes much earlier than expected. After a whole school year of up and at ‘em, they are now decidedly slacking. I’ve decided that is okay for now. I will wean them back to the harsh reality of getting their acts together when we are all ready for me to go back to work.
***************
Some of the scariest moments of my life have been filled with worry about my children. Fortunately these days, mostly I’m feeling moments of joy, peace and an unclenching of my heart as my kids demonstrate resiliency and emotional fluency they are mastering in the process of recovering from the first real moments where their lives went sideways. Not that there haven’t been hardships in their lives, but the divorce and relocation were the first big “oh shit” moments they’ve experienced, where their lives unfolded in drastically unexpected ways. They’re both learning to deal with disappointment and not to let a bad moment ruin their entire day. They are better able to communicate their needs and are more open and loving people than the angry (albeit justifiably) and resentful people they were at the beginning of this big change. Bittersweet indeed that just as they develop these nuanced personalities, they are nearly done being my full-time responsibility. I swear, they were toddlers & preschoolers like 20 minutes ago, where has the time gone?!?
***************
One of the dizzying things about this temporary job I’ve got is that it is squarely in the “other half” of the health care system from where I have been situated as a resident. Instead of seeing patients and learning clinical decision making, I’m dealing with a lot of administration, billing, health information management, insurance (private & public) and practice management issues. These are real and important issues and it is amazing how divorced they are from the day to day work of taking care of patients. We have a whole office of billing & HIM people who retrieve & send out records and submit and manage reimbursements. This is a very necessary part of the current structure of our delivery of health care. Granted, I think Medicare for all is the way to go, but DAMN there is going to be some serious unemployment that we will have to deal with if that ever were to become the way things work. There are so many middle men in medicine, I can’t even accurately convey the scope of it.
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