NURS FPX 8010 Assessment 4 Quality Improvement Proposal NURS-FPX 8010 Executive Leadership in Contemporary Nursing Quality Improvement Proposal

“A successful nursing strategic plan establishes a roadmap for the future. It gives nurses a direction to follow and can refresh and reenergize an organization. A robust strategic plan is a critical component to ensure excellent patient care and the best possible outcomes” (Lal, 2020). To provide high-quality, cost-effective care, the creation of a department-specific strategic plan and balanced scorecard has been developed (see Figure A1).

A growing source of frustration for patients and providers alike is inbox management. The ability to communicate with healthcare providers through email-like systems has become more prominent in the last decade. The NextGen Electronic Health Record (EHR), used at Adelante, like its many competitors, is not a perfect system, and yet more and more patients prefer and even expect timely messaging and results to and from their health practitioner. But when that system is flawed, it can create larger issues. At Adelante, the organization saw a 12% increase in provider attrition which mostly resulted from poor inbox management and/or a lack of a plan to support the large workload.

NURS FPX 8010 Assessment 4 Quality Improvement Proposal

Looking beyond the providers, patients are experiencing delayed care, diagnoses, referrals, and communication, which is ultimately damaging Adelante’s brand and reputation because of its direct impact on the patient experience. With the organizational demands to increase patient visits, enhance the quality of the visits, support digital infrastructure, and the decrease in available provider administrative time, the inbox management problem continues to grow. Patient messages are getting lost in the shuffle, and clinical staff don’t have the time to sort through the large volume of daily tasks. To put it simply, staff are overwhelmed, and patients are suffering.

A key performance indicator (KPI) measure within the patient domain on Adelante’s balanced scorecard is patient satisfaction. Aligning with this indicator, the nursing department has chosen to elevate nursing practices aimed at patient-centric models of care and focus on the patient experience as it has direct ties at Adelante. For the purpose of this quality improvement project, the provider inbox issue will be addressed, and the patient experience will be improved. Success will be measured through patient satisfaction surveys yielding an 84% or greater likelihood to recommend rating. To achieve this, new policies will be developed and instituted along with daily clinical huddles to facilitate enhanced team communications (see Figure A2).

Key Stakeholders and Policy Recommendations

To solve this issue, in-depth analysis, collaboration, and provider buy-in will be required. Globally, many stakeholders exist, including patients, providers, and informatics teams. Arguably, “Patients are the single most important stakeholder group with regard to the learning healthcare system. They are both the donors of personal clinical data and the ultimate beneficiaries from the knowledge gained” (Eichler, Bloechl-Daum, Broich et al., 2018). More specifically, however, three departmental sponsors are called out in support of this proposal.

N.G. works in the Clinical Informatics department. N.G. will be instrumental in the data collection, analysis, and dissemination portion of this project. In addition, she can help build technical specifications to support optimization of the provider inboxes. A.F. is the Quality Director and has a strong background in quality and manages a team that will help keep the project on track and within the regulatory confines of the organization.

Also, considering this project is designed to impact providers and patients, A.F.’s involvement will keep the patient experience top of mind. S.A.L. is the Regional Medical Director (RMD) for advanced practice providers and is responsible for providing leadership and direct oversight to APPs. She is a prior doctoral student and understands the intricacies involved in this project. S.A.L. has been invited into this project to keep the provider stakeholder perspective top of mind alongside the patient experience perspective.

NURS FPX 8010 Assessment 4 Quality Improvement Proposal

The two executive sponsors include the chief executive officer (CEO), P.C., and chief medical officer (CMO), R.B., at Adelante Healthcare. The CMO is responsible for providing organizational direction to licensed medical providers and their leaders to drive safe and effective medical services. As a licensed provider, the CMO also works with business administration functions and supports clinical implementation and innovation for the organization (Norris et al., 2017). Lastly, the CMO sponsorship is crucial in helping garner physician buy-in. The CEO is the key person responsib