Blogs

August 24, 2012 - Post-Town Hall Report

Aug 24, 2012 by Marc Strode, CEO
Folks,
As promised, I thought I would "check-in" and provide some updates around the shop.  I had a nice time off w/ the family.  We were like traveling gypsies moving down I-10 w/ stops w/ friends and kin in SA, Houston, Baton Rouge and New Orleans and finally to the beach in Alabama.  A long way from Del Rio!  But the trusted family truckster found its way back. 

One neat deal was taking a picture in front of the hotel in the French Quarter w/ the boys and Paige...the same spot Paige and I were when we were 22 and on a fraternity weekend trip.  Needless to say hanging out all day in NOLA w/ the boys required a different itinerary than other trips!  We had fun!

OK. Back to VVRMC. 

I talked about the Shannon Clinic deal yesterday, and not much more to say or speculate on how that will all play out at this point, but we've started our process of evaluating the opportunity.  Stay tuned.

We anticipate starting to use the Telemedicine Robot in the ED sometime in October.  We are very excited about this.  We will use it primarily to beam into heart specialists, stroke specialists and psych specialists in SA hoping to be able to keep more patients in Del Rio for their care. 

Members of the South Texas Radiology Group will be on site next Tuesday to take a look at VVRMC.  They start their services here on Sept 10.  They will be doing all the after-hours reads for us and will help w/ some of the specialty reads as well.  We could not have pulled this off without our PACS conversion.  We are excited about this new partnership. 

There continues to be a lot of focus on the ED.  We have a wonderful new Medical Director in Dr. Sanchez, and we are seeing better results all around on our patient satisfaction, MD satisfaction and wait times.  We look at these as a team daily and make sure that we are firing on all cylinders.  ED wait times are 10% of our bonus this year.  Many people have a hand in helping to move patients in the ED.  Lab.  Radiology.  Case management.  Housekeeping.  RT.  nursing units, etc. etc.  So we have to continue to work as a team and when we find roadblocks work together to solve them.  I can tell you from my standpoint your Senior Leadership team is more than willing to help you support you to reach our goals.  Our community wants this and we are well-intended and capable to deliver!!!

Our psychiatric services will be transitioning in September.  For most of you, this will be a seemless transition.  We will have a new Medical Director of Psychiatry for VVRMC, Dr. Holly DuBois.  She will initially help us w/ the Heritage program but quickly help us expand our psych services beyond just this one population.  We will also do this through the use of telemedicine.  She is eager to help meet the needs of the community and work w/ our primary care docs, many who are left to try and manage complex patients in their practice as best they can.  Now they will have more support.  And Jaime will still be at the helm.  He has for a long time been a contracted employee and we are proud to now have him officially on the team and permanently as our fearless psychiatric leader!!!!!  Jaime, you da' man!  We are going to be purchasing a new van for the program, and you remember that show on MTV called Pimp My Ride?  We are going to dress this van up pretty good so that when it's rolling down Ave G there's no question it's w/ VVRMC!!!!

The place is looking good!  Each day we chip away on our remodel.  Most folks don't wonder back through the Surgical Services area, but we are hard at work in Surgery, spending nearly $40,000 making much needed Life Safety and cosmetic improvements in the OR.  Duckie--I think we are finally getting that one hole fixed!!!  Martin W., Marco and team great job on getting it knocked out.  Long overdue. 

United Way.  Man, you guys rock!  It feels good to give back and you did nicely yesterday in our Kick-Off party.   Both day and night shift.  This will be a fun month or so of parties and fundraisers to make sure we maintain our spot as the top givers in town for many, many worthwhile organizations that depend on United Way funding for their programs. 

Have a great weekend and as always, Keep the Spirit,
Marc