A strategic collaboration with jurisdictional health bodies and an internationally-renowned improvement science organisation has resulted in the first cohort of Queensland Health staff to graduate as improvement advisors.
The Clinical Excellence Division (CED) has partnered with NSW Health and ACT Health to bring the training programs offered by the not-for-profit organisation Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) to Australia for the first time. With IHI based in Cambridge, Massachusetts this program has provided a limited number of Australians with a unique and valuable professional development opportunity.
CED has so far funded 45 staff from Hospital and Health Services and from within the Department to complete IHI training programs the Breakthrough Series Collaborative (35 participants) and the Improvement Advisor program (ten participants). Our investment in IHI’s methodologies, is designed to build local improvement capability in support of achieving better patient outcomes, and in the longer-term; achieve and sustain a cultural appetite for continual improvement within Queensland Health.
Nine staff have completed the improvement advisor (IA) training, which consisted of three, four-day immersion workshops as well as monthly webinars over a ten month period. By educating participants on improvement science principles and techniques, it provides participants with the tools and knowledge to drive cultural and system changes in their work areas. Each person was required to be responsible for one or more improvement projects throughout the project, providing real-time application of course content and helping to cement their learning.
One of the new IA graduates is Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Service Acting Nursing Director Michael Rice. Michael has incorporated the training into PSQIS’ Recognise Early Signs and Initiate Sepsis Treatment or RESIST Sepsis program. He said the aim of the program is to achieve measurable and sustainable improvement in sepsis outcomes through early recognition, escalation and treatment. A pilot program is underway at Gold Coast University Hospital which will inform a statewide approach to improving sepsis outcomes for adult and paediatric patients.
Ben Reid from Children’s Health Queensland Hospital and Health Service said the improvement advisor training had provided him with a solid foundation for healthcare improvement and improvement science. "My project has expanded from a small project to a potential statewide prototype. I am now able to provide advice and support to colleagues in progressing best-practice improvement projects within a healthcare environment."
Some of the staff trained in the Breakthrough Series Collaborative (BTS) methodology are in the process of establishing three collaboratives in the fields of care for the frail, adult and paediatric sepsis. Queensland BTS graduates are also participating in national collaboratives with fellow graduates from interstate, such as the third and fourth-degree perineal tears collaborative.
To further embed improvement science in Australia’s healthcare environment, a community of practice is being developed which currently includes four Queensland representatives.
