GME trainees reveal health system excellence during Performance Excellence Week

Feb. 26, 2018

OHSU held its fifth annual Performance Excellence Week from Feb. 12-16. This year's event celebrated stories that connect performance excellence to OHSU's vision of improving the health and well-being of all Oregonians and beyond.

The School of Medicine's Office of Graduate Medical Education has embraced Performance Excellence Week. This year, residents and fellows across the school highlighted the myriad quality and system improvement projects they are spearheading. Congratulations to the 2018 awardees.

3MT® competition is all about the story

Also known as the competition that boils years of work and hours of prep into three minutes of glory, the Three Minute Thesis competition is based on the global model for Ph.D. candidates. Participants have only one visual slide and three minutes to describe their project – no easy task!

Kelli Lund, M.D., fellow in pediatric neonatal and perinatal medicine, won first place. Dr. Lund presented “Teamwork and Communication During Telemedicine-based Neonatal Resuscitation.”

Second place was given to Garrett Waagmeester, M.D., chief resident for quality and patient safety, V.A. Portland Health Care System, representing the Housestaff Quality and Safety Council, who presented “Housestaff Perception of Culture of Safety and Barriers to Incident Reporting.”

The People’s Choice Award was given to Heather Hoops, M.D., resident in general surgery, who presented “Resident-Driven Development of a Standardized Department of Surgery Note Template.”

Poster symposium highlights trainee efforts in quality, system design

The first place poster belonged to Hayden Oldham, M.D., resident in internal medicine. Dr. Oldham led a project titled “A Breath of Fresh Care: Increasing Referrals for Pulmonary Rehabilitation after Admission for Acute Exacerbation of COPD.”

Dr. Hoops’ was the second place poster, which covered “Coding Wisely: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Improving the Accuracy of Resident Medical Documentation.”

Tarin Worrest, M.D., resident in general surgery, won third place in the poster competition. Dr. Worrest’s project was on “Characteristics of Surgical Patients who Return to the Emergency Department with Pain.”

The program award for the most submitted and/or accepted poster and 3MT abstracts went to General Surgery. Brett Sheppard, M.D., professor of surgery, OHSU School of Medicine, received the faculty mentor award. In nominations, residents said: “Dr. Sheppard has been so supportive of all our quality projects this year. From assisting in the initiation of projects to overall support and mentoring, Dr. Sheppard has been a perfect example of incorporating quality metrics into clinical practice.”

GME also hosted Grand Rounds during Performance Excellence Week. The Housestaff Quality and Safety Council co-chairs and faculty liaison presented their model for improvement coaching. They described the importance of coaching as it relates to professional development in medicine, and explained how the HQSC applies coaching techniques to create an engaged workforce literate in improvement science. Speakers included:

• Lisa Kipersztok, M.D., M.P.H., resident in family medicine
•  Garrett Waagmeester, M.D., chief resident for quality and patient safety, V.A. Portland Health Care System
• Stuart Zeltzer, M.D., resident in family medicine
• Jacob Luty, M.D., assistant professor of medicine, OHSU School of Medicine, and medical director of performance improvement for GME

OPEx is the name for the OHSU Performance Excellence System; it's an operating system comprised of mindset, management system and methods for achieving continuous performance improvement across the clinical enterprise. OPEx exemplifies the continuous journey to deliver better value to OHSU patients. Trainees, faculty members and staff can learn more about Performance Excellence Week on O2 (OHSU login required).

Pictured, from top:

Improvement takes coaching: (left to right) Drs. Stuart Zeltzer, Jacob Luty, Lisa Kipersztok and Garrett Waagmeester during GME Grand Rounds on Feb. 13.

Three-minute masters: Dr. Kelli Lund (second from top, at left), with Christopher Swide, M.D., associate dean for GME, OHSU School of Medicine, took first place in the 3MT competition. Dr. Garrett Waagmeester (third from top, at left) took second and Dr. Heather Hoops (above, at left) was the people’s choice awardee.

Super surgery: (left to right) Drs. Brett Sheppard, Melissa DeSouza, Tarin Worrest, Katherine Kelly, Heather Hoops and Karen Brasel accepted the program award for General Surgery and Faculty Mentor Award.