Now That’s Teamwork
A Shining Example of Teams Working Together for Nursing Home Hospice Patients
July 19, 2023–Teams Featured: Business Development, Personal Care and Hospice Care For VNS Health home health aide Delores Yearwood Pile, her job providing care to VNS Health Hospice patients at a large skilled nursing facility in the Bronx keeps her on her toes—literally. “I might begin my shift by giving one patient a bath and then dressing her in a set of fresh clothes and feeding her,” she says. “Then I’ll walk a short distance and do the same with another patient. An hour later, I’m on to a third patient. And in between these visits, I’ll circle back to check on the others. Every minute I’m there, I’m providing important help to someone—plus, it gives variety to my day!” When Delores’s shift is done, another VNS Health aide will follow a similar routine with the same patients. This rotating care is a hallmark of VNS Health’s new “Cluster Care” hospice model.
Now That’s Teamwork
How a “One VNS Health” Teamwork Effort Led to a New App and an Improved Consumer Experience
April 27, 2023–One of the most common questions VNS Health Home Care patients call our Contact Center about is, “What time is my nurse, rehab therapist or social worker coming?” Those calls will be happening less often, however, and here’s why: Team members from across the organization—from VNS Health’s IT, Education and Marketing teams to our frontline field clinicians and Contact Center agents—worked together in a “One VNS Health” group effort to create an app called My Home Care. This new app lets Home Care patients (and their family members who’ve downloaded the app) see at a glance when their next clinician’s visit will take place, right on their smartphone. The My Home Care app became available to all VNS Health Home Care patients last October. The app tells patients, within a two-hour window, when their home care clinician will arrive for an upcoming visit. It also displays the clinician’s name and
Now That’s Teamwork: The Village Behind the My Home Care App
April 27, 2023–Problem: VNS Health home care patients and family members wanted more information about when their clinician was expected to arrive. Solution: Why not develop an app that allows patients and family members to see when their scheduled home care visits would be, and who was coming? This past October, VNS Health did just that when it launched the My Home Care app. Home Care patients and family members can download the app to their mobile phone or log into an online portal to find out when their next visit from a VNS Health nurse, rehab therapist or social worker will take place. (Information on home health aides will be added in future upgrades.) They can also use the My Home Care app to receive updates about upcoming visits, provide feedback to VNS Health, and connect to helpful home care information and resources. Just as it takes a village to raise
“Now That’s Teamwork!”: Listening to Patients, Plants and Each Member of the Team
February 28, 2023–When the Brooklyn West Hospice team first came to care for Kathy*, they could see her life stories evident in every inch of her walk-up apartment. Plants abounded, including a bougainvillea lacing the walls of her bedroom. Driftwood was perched everywhere. Soon-to-hatch pigeon eggs nested inside the window. As the team would soon learn, their care of Kathy would be guided by lessons inherent in the nature that was very much on view. “Listen to the plants,” said Anna Jenkins, a Hospice Spiritual Care Counselor, quoting Kathy. “They will tell you what they need. Trust their communication.” And the VNS Health Hospice Care team listened – each taking guidance from their patient on how she wanted to receive care as she lived her final chapter with her illness and its debilitating physical and behavioral symptoms. “Through her telling us how to be a gardener, she taught me how to help
“Now That’s Teamwork!”: How Three Live-In HHAs and Their HHA Supervisor Care for Their Client—and Each Other
January 11, 2023–Introducing Now That’s Teamwork—a new Frontline series that features VNS Health teamwork in action. When home health aides Yolanda Campbell, Jennifer Moulton, and Judith White originally started caring for Sebastian Greene*, they were primarily tending to his wife, who had dementia. When her condition worsened and 24-hour care became necessary, the team transitioned to a live-in situation. Then when Mrs. Greene was ultimately hospitalized, the decision was made to keep the same team, on a live-in basis, for Sebastian, who is in his 90s. Sebastian’s wife died shortly after that, so she never returned home. “It was a difficult time for Sebastian—they had been married for over 65 years,” says Yolanda. “It’s still an open wound, but things have gotten much better for him now. I know that having the same team of home health aides is a comfort to him.” A tight schedule—and a tight-knit team Because of Sebastian’s complex medical needs, it’s critical