New display highlights documentation champions and heroes

15 Apr 2018

Introducing the Kudos to You board by the lounge

By: Robben Morin, RN CCDS Certified Clinical Documentation Specialist

 

I’m pleased to introduce you to the “Kudos to You” board outside the Physicians’ Lounge in Building A. The idea came after talking with Chief Medical Information Officer Claire O’Brien about recognizing providers who improve their documentation, which includes improving their query response rate and showing interaction with the Clinical Document Improvement Team through query replies.

We appreciate those who “stand out from the crowd” and led to our Lean improvement process. So far, the kudos board has been well received.

The CDI Team believes complete documentation helps create a better profile for the patient during each stay. It is a more compliant document; it clearly shares patient conditions with the next providers who care for them — and that increases safety and quality control. Better documentation means better patient care and patient outcomes.

What does all this have to do with the Kudos to You Board? Everything! We want our providers to know how much we appreciate them working hard on their documentation and query response rates.

We understand that getting queries can cause unwanted stress and work. We get it. Unfortunately, queries won’t go away – it’s one of our biggest tools to help you become great medical documentation super heroes. Working together really does make a difference in patient care, and although the process can be tedious, we appreciate your cooperation.

So how do we choose our monthly champion? The CDI Team looks for the following:

Criteria for nomination

• The provider shows consistent efforts to improve documentation.
• The flow of their documentation is precise and easy to understand; for example, each diagnosis includes treatment plan, estimated length of stay and provides the most current status of the diagnosis being treated.
• Diagnoses flow through the chart and include the final status in the Discharge Summary.
• Documentation had a significant impact on the chart. Please give examples, e.g. increased DRG or addressed SOI/ROM.

The WOW Factor. Any provider who has done something out of their norm, such as:

• Documentation WOW: For example diagnosing a patient without prompting from the CDS Team via the query process.

• Conversation WOW: Sending a personal, constructive or positive email to the CDS or CDI Team, or including positive feedback with their query response.
• Query WOW: Replying to a query the same day (when they normally reply after several days).
• Providing additional information in a query response, such as an explanation for their reply, clinical indicators for their diagnosis.

Questions? Contact me at Robben.Morin@SalemHealth.org. We are all RNs and most of us are Certified Clinical Documentation Improvement Specialists. Also contact the following for help:

Debra Harris, MA  RHIA, HIM Director                             
Jacqueline Smith, RN CCDS, CDI Manager                       
Dr. Claire O’Brien, Chief Medical Information Officer   
Catherine Andrews, RHIT, CCS, CDIP                                  
Catherine Trevis, RN CCDS                                                    
Coleen Elser, RN CCDS                                                             
Karen Gray, RN CCDS                                                               
Lindsay Newcomer, RN BSN CDI                                                    
Patti Moore, RN BSN CCDS                                                   
Rhonda Finney, RN CCDS                                                        
Robben Morin, RN CCDS                                                      
Terryn Spragg, RN CCDS                                                      
Toni Salchenberg, RN BSN CCDS