Selected Podcast
Using Innovative Strategies To Combat Workplace Violence
As there has been a rise in aggressive behavior and unprovoked physical and verbal assaults in society, violence in the workplace has also become increasingly common. The risk for healthcare workers, however, has been disproportionate. This organization has faced this alarming trend head on with data-driven and shared governance interventions that are innovative. The strategies are caregiver- and patient-centric taking the stance that team member safety is equally as important as patient safety.
Featuring:
Veronica Nolden is the Nurse Manager, Professional Practice and the Magnet Program Director at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center. Veronica holds a Master’s degree in Nursing Administration and Leadership. Over the past 5 years, Veronica has led organizational initiatives around professional practice, pain, orientation, shared governance and violence prevention. Most recently, she led the organization to their fourth Magnet® designation. Most importantly, she is proud mother, Liam (6) and Max (3) and a loving wife.
Trina Trimmer, MSN, RNC-MNN, NEA-BC | Veronica Nolden, MS, RN, NEA-BC
Trina Trimmer is currently the Nursing Director for Safety & Regulatory Compliance at VCU Health System. She has worked with the Health System for over 20 years. She spent the first sixteen years of her career working in the Mother Infant Care Unit as a Care Partner, staff nurse, Clinical Coordinator, and then Nurse Clinician. Trimmer then served as the liaison for barcode medication administration and transitioned to the role of Nursing Safety Operations & Resources Manager, which was later upgraded to the Director level.Veronica Nolden is the Nurse Manager, Professional Practice and the Magnet Program Director at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center. Veronica holds a Master’s degree in Nursing Administration and Leadership. Over the past 5 years, Veronica has led organizational initiatives around professional practice, pain, orientation, shared governance and violence prevention. Most recently, she led the organization to their fourth Magnet® designation. Most importantly, she is proud mother, Liam (6) and Max (3) and a loving wife.
Transcription:
Bill Klaproth (Host): On this podcast, we're going to talk about workplace violence and how you can use innovative strategies and tactics to address this issue. With me is Veronica Nolan, Nurse Manager, Professional Practice at VCU Medical Center. And Trina Trimmer, Interim Chief Nursing Informatics Officer and Safety and Regulatory Compliance at VCU Health System in Richmond, Virginia.
This is Today in Nursing Leadership, a podcast from the American Organization for Nursing Leadership. I'm Bill Klaproth. Trina and Veronica, thank you so much for your time. It is great to talk with you on such an important topic, quite frankly. So, I know there are different forms of workplace violence. Veronica, let me start with you. Can you tell us what the core issue is? And when you say workplace violence, what is that?
Veronica Nolden, MS, RN, NEA-BC (Guest): Yeah. Thank you so much for having us here. We are delighted to be able to share. And so when we talk about workplace violence, and the tactics and strategies that we implemented at VCU Medical Center today, what we're really talking about is physical and verbal violence against healthcare providers, typically from patients or their family members.
And there's an entire spectrum of reasons why this occurs. And so a lot of our work is around, how we target that, how we look at it and then how we help combat it. And it really looks at the whole team. So, we initially started focusing on healthcare providers, but we've realized over time that some of our nonclinical team members who work in the healthcare setting are also on the end of workplace violence from our patients, families or others. And so our scope has expanded to include those interprofessionals as well.
Host: I imagine with everything that nurses have to go through throughout the day, all the stressors they're are, having to deal with workplace violence, like you've talked about physical and verbal abuse from patients and families; that's just gotta be adding insult to injury with everything else that goes on.
Veronica: It really is. And we are seeing a rise in people leaving the profession related to this violence. So it's, a really important topic and it's so important that the joint commission has deemed it. They had a Sentinel event alert number 59, and then they've also added new standards, to really help combat this as well as we're a Magnet Organization and there's a Magnet Standard around workplace violence. So a national trend increasing the focus on the reduction of workplace violence in healthcare.
Host: Right. Wow. Well, thank you for explaining that to us. So, Trina, can you talk to us about what you did at VCU, tactics and initiatives that you use to address this issue?
Trina Trimmer, MSN, RNC-MNN, NEA-BC (Guest): Yes, absolutely. One of the things that we realized very early on is that there were many team members and departments trying to solve these issues within their own area. And we need to pull them together to really be able to identify what the issues going on at the health system were so that we could put resources in place to address the issue.
And we also recognized very early, that team members thought that this was part of their expected work. And we wanted to change that culture to really help team members understand that the zero tolerance culture needed to be adopted at VCU Health. And we engaged team members from every level, from the bedside, all the way to executive leadership. And one of the ways that we used to capture these incidences was a post assault huddle form. The post assault huddle form was developed and piloted initially with our emergency department and our behavioral health team members. Because at that time, we thought that that's where the greater incidents of issues were occurring.
So we utilized our team members, at the bedside to help us develop that huddle and reporting. We also moved that from a paper process to an electronic process so that we would be able to allow team members reporting, an easier way to do so, as well as making an easier way for us to capture that. The data then is shared back in various ways. One is with our work groups, so that we can help them understand where the greater incidences are occurring. So one of the things we realized very early on with collecting the data was that delirium was a greater contributor to these incidences occurring. Sharing that data back with the delirium task force, enabled them to be able to strategize how they would follow up with team members to address these issues. Another way that we reported our data was through our daily operations briefing, which is where we have team members from all departments across the health system. And really just helping team members understand the importance of that zero tolerance culture.
We've had a greater increase of reporting, which we do not think is in alignment with greater incidences occurring. We just feel that we have now given our team members a easier process for reporting, but we also continue to monitor that data so that again, we can make sure that we have the resources in place to address the issue.
Host: Trina, that's really interesting. So the post assault huddle form. And you use that any time an incident happened is that how that works?
Trina: Yes. So it would be utilized if there was a patient, violent behavior and, or team member to team member as well as visitors. So, it would capture any of those incidences occurring in the health system, both inpatient and ambulatory.
Host: Data collection is so important and really can give you insights and learnings where you might not have thought you would find them. And I'm sure that's what you found out when you mentioned delirium. Okay. We have a problem here. Maybe we didn't know that before, but there's a problem with delirium. So, now we can come up with initiatives and tactics to try to reduce the problem there. There is that right?
Trina: That's correct. So to say more about the delirium taskforce and what they did with that was to develop a process by which an assessment tool was utilized within our health system, to be able to identify patients that were experiencing delirium, also working with our provider teams to make sure that the appropriate plan of care was put into place, which includes medications, et cetera.
Host: And you also mentioned senior leadership. How important was it to get buy-in from senior leadership on these initiatives and strategies?
Trina: I believe that the engagement from our senior leaders was just as important as our clinical team members. We, as I mentioned earlier, developed a committee for workplace violence, which is comprised of many team members at all levels and various departments across the health system. We continue to meet monthly. They are the ones that also see the data that is being collected. But, the senior leadership engagement was really key to making sure that we were able to have a greater number of initiatives happen over the past few years. We believe that there's no one approach or no one initiative that has really led us to our success, but it really is just a collaboration amongst many team members across the many departments within the health system.
Host: Yeah. So it sounds like it takes the whole team pulling in the same direction and Veronica for a nurse leader listening to this that might be saying to themselves, gosh, we have the same type of workplace violence issue. I want to start to employ some strategies to combat that. Where should they start? What are the key takeaways here? What are the steps that need to be taken?
Veronica: Yeah. So I'm going to piggyback off of what Trina said too, and key into some of her concepts, which was that our group is incredibly interprofessional, recognizing that violence really cross cuts. And so we need to make sure we have equal representation at the table, including our leaders, but also our frontline team members who really can speak to what's going on.
And I think when we talk about leadership support, that was critical for us getting off the ground. We, as an organization needed to set what zero tolerance really meant for us. And so having our senior leaders at the table, and their support, we were able to say, this is our zero tolerance policy. This is what it looks like. And we were able to put signs up. We were able to include that in some of our patient orientation, as well as our team member orientation. So, to make sure that they recognize this is not a part of my job. This is going to change and VC was working on it. And I think the other thing that is really important is to use the data that you're getting.
Trina mentioned this about the work that we did around delirium, but another thing that we saw with our data was that we were having repeat assault with the same patient. And what we recognize when we really looked at it was we didn't have a great process to communicate risk of violence for the patients. And so we developed a tool within our electronic medical record that was teired to support our zero tolerance policy. So if a patient is verbally violent, that is often a precursor to a physical violent event. And so we're able to now communicate that risk across the continuum of care. So if the patient's inpatient or ambulatory, we're able to do that.
And that's just one example of how we use that data. And we continue to do that. Monthly, we evaluate the data, we evaluate the assault and we're constantly learning and changing and growing. So I think that's another thing that we would definitely want people to get from this podcast. And then I think the final thing is to really look at, what might need to be implemented in a discreet area and see if it has implications in other areas. One of the other things that we worked on was a verbal deescalation tool for ambulatory colleagues who were experiencing verbal violence via the telephone and leveraging our interprofessional group that had people from inpatient and ambulatory, as we were preparing to implement, some of the nurses said, well, wait a minute, this is relevant to inpatient.
We get verbally violent phone calls from past patients or family members who are distraught. And we could really use this tool to help us in the moment. And so really making sure that you're looking from a 30,000 foot view of how does this apply in other areas?
Host: Absolutely. And it sounds like training came along with this too, as you were talking about the verbal deescalation tool, is that right?
Veronica: There was training, but also everything that we create, we try to create in a way that you could pick up and use today, that you don't have to have a ton of advanced training to be able to use. And so, for example, the verbal deescalation tool, says, okay, this is what's happening. Here are some things I can say back, here are some suggestions for language. Here are some tips and tricks, so that in the moment you're not having to draw on training you might've received two or three years ago, but you really have what you need just in time.
Host: Absolutely. And that can really be helpful in the moment. So, Trina, can you talk about the success of this? Measurable results or have you seen any unanticipated benefits or something that has surprised you with this program?
Trina: Sure. So I think I'll go back to what I mentioned previously about changing that culture. It really was about making sure that our team members knew that there was a listening person on the other side of reporting that incident. And so the engagement that we've seen across the health system with making sure that they are reporting incidences and that there is someone tracking those and doing something about them was really important. I will say that the data-driven approach that we have taken has also contributed to our success. So, knowing that the data that's being monitored by various groups. I have already mentioned the work groups similar to delirium, but there are other work groups that are monitoring the data as well.
Then from an organizational leadership perspective. So, Veronica mentioned those posters that we had to really talk about our zero tolerance. And so we wanted to make sure that, that was adopted across the health system in various ways. But I think the bigger story telling tale of all the work that we have done is significant decrease or a decline that it has been ongoing for the level of injury.
Even though we had, as I mentioned earlier, an increase in the number of reported incidents, we do not believe that there were more happening. We believe that we are capturing them because we've established a process by which team members can do that. But the severity of injury, having a steady decline over time tells us a story that we have had success with all of the initiatives that we've put in place to protect our team members, as well as our patients. We also track the number of lost days from work, and we've seen an improvement in that processe as well.
Host: Well, that is really good news and congrats on that. And I would imagine another benefit is the nurses probably really feel that hey, nurse leadership has our back. They're trying to take care of us. They're trying to look out for us. I bet that has been a positive effect as well.
Trina: Absolutely. We know, as you mentioned earlier, that our nurses are very busy at the bedside doing a lot of things and as well as the chair side in our ambulatory arena. So, we try to balance asking them to add in additional steps, such as reporting. One of things that we did to streamline that reporting, after we got it electronic was we wanted to be able to capture verbal assaults. We know that those verbal assaults have a similar impact to team members and we wanted to capture those. So, we were able to modify our reporting process to capture the verbal assaults in a more streamlined way without having to answer as many questions on that reporting. So again, I think that doing that and making it easier for nurses that are having to report, they know that we're listening. We're continuing to make these modifications to make it an easier process for reporting and engaging them in our changes as well.
Host: Right. And Veronica, any surprise outcomes or benefits that you've seen?
Veronica: I think the biggest surprise outcome is the increased engagement. We knew that this was important and we wanted to make a difference, but I still remember when Trina first came to a group of clinical nurses and said, here's the post-assault huddle. This is what we want you to do. And the nurse was like, this is extra work. I don't understand how this is going to benefit me. I don't see why I would put this report in. My patient is just a little bit delirious. It's not a big deal. And now what we've seen is our clinical nurses at the bedside, if they are assaulted, they put in the report and then they seek resolution and they want to be involved in the solution which is really cool to see, because that's what we want. We want those people who are the most impacted by this to engage in the solution. And that's what we're getting.
Host: Yeah. Interesting that you got a little bit of pushback a little bit, but now after seeing the results, it sounds like there's total buy-in. People are engaged with it now. So, yeah, really interesting. Well, I want to thank you both for your time today, Veronica and Trina, but before we go, I'd like to ask, is there anything you'd like to share at all? Trina, let's start with you. Anything you want to share or anything that we missed or you want to add?
Trina: I think I would just like to highlight the importance of the data-driven approach that we have taken at VCU Health. The engagement of team members at all levels has really led us to our success across departments. I think that again, the number of initiatives that we've been able to accomplish in such a short period of time really is the reason why we have seen the success that we've had. Just would like to highlight those items. Thank you so much.
Host: No, absolutely. And Veronica, how about you? Anything else you'd like to add or share?
Veronica: Oh, yeah. You know, I think we could talk about this all day. It's a topic that's near and dear to our hearts, but we would not be anywhere without the committee that we have and the strength of our members. We have representation from safety, security, police, risk management, providers. You name it. If there's a specialty or department, they're on our group and they're helping push these initiatives forward. And we really recognize that it doesn't take one person, it takes a whole group. And so that's what I really think is the biggest thing for us is how you engage leaders and team members from across disciplines really helped us move forward.
Host: Well, gosh, it's been a treat to talk with both of you today. And again, like I said earlier, such an important topic, so great job to both of you and what you've accomplished at VCU, Trina and Veronica, thank you so much for your time today. It's really been a pleasure to have you on.
Veronica: Thank you.
Trina: Absolutely. Thank you for having us.
Host: And once again, that's Veronica Nolden and Trina Trimmer. And for more information, please visit aonl.org. And if you found this podcast helpful, please share it on your social channels and check out the full podcast library for topics of interest to you. This is Today in Nursing Leadership. Thanks for listening.
Bill Klaproth (Host): On this podcast, we're going to talk about workplace violence and how you can use innovative strategies and tactics to address this issue. With me is Veronica Nolan, Nurse Manager, Professional Practice at VCU Medical Center. And Trina Trimmer, Interim Chief Nursing Informatics Officer and Safety and Regulatory Compliance at VCU Health System in Richmond, Virginia.
This is Today in Nursing Leadership, a podcast from the American Organization for Nursing Leadership. I'm Bill Klaproth. Trina and Veronica, thank you so much for your time. It is great to talk with you on such an important topic, quite frankly. So, I know there are different forms of workplace violence. Veronica, let me start with you. Can you tell us what the core issue is? And when you say workplace violence, what is that?
Veronica Nolden, MS, RN, NEA-BC (Guest): Yeah. Thank you so much for having us here. We are delighted to be able to share. And so when we talk about workplace violence, and the tactics and strategies that we implemented at VCU Medical Center today, what we're really talking about is physical and verbal violence against healthcare providers, typically from patients or their family members.
And there's an entire spectrum of reasons why this occurs. And so a lot of our work is around, how we target that, how we look at it and then how we help combat it. And it really looks at the whole team. So, we initially started focusing on healthcare providers, but we've realized over time that some of our nonclinical team members who work in the healthcare setting are also on the end of workplace violence from our patients, families or others. And so our scope has expanded to include those interprofessionals as well.
Host: I imagine with everything that nurses have to go through throughout the day, all the stressors they're are, having to deal with workplace violence, like you've talked about physical and verbal abuse from patients and families; that's just gotta be adding insult to injury with everything else that goes on.
Veronica: It really is. And we are seeing a rise in people leaving the profession related to this violence. So it's, a really important topic and it's so important that the joint commission has deemed it. They had a Sentinel event alert number 59, and then they've also added new standards, to really help combat this as well as we're a Magnet Organization and there's a Magnet Standard around workplace violence. So a national trend increasing the focus on the reduction of workplace violence in healthcare.
Host: Right. Wow. Well, thank you for explaining that to us. So, Trina, can you talk to us about what you did at VCU, tactics and initiatives that you use to address this issue?
Trina Trimmer, MSN, RNC-MNN, NEA-BC (Guest): Yes, absolutely. One of the things that we realized very early on is that there were many team members and departments trying to solve these issues within their own area. And we need to pull them together to really be able to identify what the issues going on at the health system were so that we could put resources in place to address the issue.
And we also recognized very early, that team members thought that this was part of their expected work. And we wanted to change that culture to really help team members understand that the zero tolerance culture needed to be adopted at VCU Health. And we engaged team members from every level, from the bedside, all the way to executive leadership. And one of the ways that we used to capture these incidences was a post assault huddle form. The post assault huddle form was developed and piloted initially with our emergency department and our behavioral health team members. Because at that time, we thought that that's where the greater incidents of issues were occurring.
So we utilized our team members, at the bedside to help us develop that huddle and reporting. We also moved that from a paper process to an electronic process so that we would be able to allow team members reporting, an easier way to do so, as well as making an easier way for us to capture that. The data then is shared back in various ways. One is with our work groups, so that we can help them understand where the greater incidences are occurring. So one of the things we realized very early on with collecting the data was that delirium was a greater contributor to these incidences occurring. Sharing that data back with the delirium task force, enabled them to be able to strategize how they would follow up with team members to address these issues. Another way that we reported our data was through our daily operations briefing, which is where we have team members from all departments across the health system. And really just helping team members understand the importance of that zero tolerance culture.
We've had a greater increase of reporting, which we do not think is in alignment with greater incidences occurring. We just feel that we have now given our team members a easier process for reporting, but we also continue to monitor that data so that again, we can make sure that we have the resources in place to address the issue.
Host: Trina, that's really interesting. So the post assault huddle form. And you use that any time an incident happened is that how that works?
Trina: Yes. So it would be utilized if there was a patient, violent behavior and, or team member to team member as well as visitors. So, it would capture any of those incidences occurring in the health system, both inpatient and ambulatory.
Host: Data collection is so important and really can give you insights and learnings where you might not have thought you would find them. And I'm sure that's what you found out when you mentioned delirium. Okay. We have a problem here. Maybe we didn't know that before, but there's a problem with delirium. So, now we can come up with initiatives and tactics to try to reduce the problem there. There is that right?
Trina: That's correct. So to say more about the delirium taskforce and what they did with that was to develop a process by which an assessment tool was utilized within our health system, to be able to identify patients that were experiencing delirium, also working with our provider teams to make sure that the appropriate plan of care was put into place, which includes medications, et cetera.
Host: And you also mentioned senior leadership. How important was it to get buy-in from senior leadership on these initiatives and strategies?
Trina: I believe that the engagement from our senior leaders was just as important as our clinical team members. We, as I mentioned earlier, developed a committee for workplace violence, which is comprised of many team members at all levels and various departments across the health system. We continue to meet monthly. They are the ones that also see the data that is being collected. But, the senior leadership engagement was really key to making sure that we were able to have a greater number of initiatives happen over the past few years. We believe that there's no one approach or no one initiative that has really led us to our success, but it really is just a collaboration amongst many team members across the many departments within the health system.
Host: Yeah. So it sounds like it takes the whole team pulling in the same direction and Veronica for a nurse leader listening to this that might be saying to themselves, gosh, we have the same type of workplace violence issue. I want to start to employ some strategies to combat that. Where should they start? What are the key takeaways here? What are the steps that need to be taken?
Veronica: Yeah. So I'm going to piggyback off of what Trina said too, and key into some of her concepts, which was that our group is incredibly interprofessional, recognizing that violence really cross cuts. And so we need to make sure we have equal representation at the table, including our leaders, but also our frontline team members who really can speak to what's going on.
And I think when we talk about leadership support, that was critical for us getting off the ground. We, as an organization needed to set what zero tolerance really meant for us. And so having our senior leaders at the table, and their support, we were able to say, this is our zero tolerance policy. This is what it looks like. And we were able to put signs up. We were able to include that in some of our patient orientation, as well as our team member orientation. So, to make sure that they recognize this is not a part of my job. This is going to change and VC was working on it. And I think the other thing that is really important is to use the data that you're getting.
Trina mentioned this about the work that we did around delirium, but another thing that we saw with our data was that we were having repeat assault with the same patient. And what we recognize when we really looked at it was we didn't have a great process to communicate risk of violence for the patients. And so we developed a tool within our electronic medical record that was teired to support our zero tolerance policy. So if a patient is verbally violent, that is often a precursor to a physical violent event. And so we're able to now communicate that risk across the continuum of care. So if the patient's inpatient or ambulatory, we're able to do that.
And that's just one example of how we use that data. And we continue to do that. Monthly, we evaluate the data, we evaluate the assault and we're constantly learning and changing and growing. So I think that's another thing that we would definitely want people to get from this podcast. And then I think the final thing is to really look at, what might need to be implemented in a discreet area and see if it has implications in other areas. One of the other things that we worked on was a verbal deescalation tool for ambulatory colleagues who were experiencing verbal violence via the telephone and leveraging our interprofessional group that had people from inpatient and ambulatory, as we were preparing to implement, some of the nurses said, well, wait a minute, this is relevant to inpatient.
We get verbally violent phone calls from past patients or family members who are distraught. And we could really use this tool to help us in the moment. And so really making sure that you're looking from a 30,000 foot view of how does this apply in other areas?
Host: Absolutely. And it sounds like training came along with this too, as you were talking about the verbal deescalation tool, is that right?
Veronica: There was training, but also everything that we create, we try to create in a way that you could pick up and use today, that you don't have to have a ton of advanced training to be able to use. And so, for example, the verbal deescalation tool, says, okay, this is what's happening. Here are some things I can say back, here are some suggestions for language. Here are some tips and tricks, so that in the moment you're not having to draw on training you might've received two or three years ago, but you really have what you need just in time.
Host: Absolutely. And that can really be helpful in the moment. So, Trina, can you talk about the success of this? Measurable results or have you seen any unanticipated benefits or something that has surprised you with this program?
Trina: Sure. So I think I'll go back to what I mentioned previously about changing that culture. It really was about making sure that our team members knew that there was a listening person on the other side of reporting that incident. And so the engagement that we've seen across the health system with making sure that they are reporting incidences and that there is someone tracking those and doing something about them was really important. I will say that the data-driven approach that we have taken has also contributed to our success. So, knowing that the data that's being monitored by various groups. I have already mentioned the work groups similar to delirium, but there are other work groups that are monitoring the data as well.
Then from an organizational leadership perspective. So, Veronica mentioned those posters that we had to really talk about our zero tolerance. And so we wanted to make sure that, that was adopted across the health system in various ways. But I think the bigger story telling tale of all the work that we have done is significant decrease or a decline that it has been ongoing for the level of injury.
Even though we had, as I mentioned earlier, an increase in the number of reported incidents, we do not believe that there were more happening. We believe that we are capturing them because we've established a process by which team members can do that. But the severity of injury, having a steady decline over time tells us a story that we have had success with all of the initiatives that we've put in place to protect our team members, as well as our patients. We also track the number of lost days from work, and we've seen an improvement in that processe as well.
Host: Well, that is really good news and congrats on that. And I would imagine another benefit is the nurses probably really feel that hey, nurse leadership has our back. They're trying to take care of us. They're trying to look out for us. I bet that has been a positive effect as well.
Trina: Absolutely. We know, as you mentioned earlier, that our nurses are very busy at the bedside doing a lot of things and as well as the chair side in our ambulatory arena. So, we try to balance asking them to add in additional steps, such as reporting. One of things that we did to streamline that reporting, after we got it electronic was we wanted to be able to capture verbal assaults. We know that those verbal assaults have a similar impact to team members and we wanted to capture those. So, we were able to modify our reporting process to capture the verbal assaults in a more streamlined way without having to answer as many questions on that reporting. So again, I think that doing that and making it easier for nurses that are having to report, they know that we're listening. We're continuing to make these modifications to make it an easier process for reporting and engaging them in our changes as well.
Host: Right. And Veronica, any surprise outcomes or benefits that you've seen?
Veronica: I think the biggest surprise outcome is the increased engagement. We knew that this was important and we wanted to make a difference, but I still remember when Trina first came to a group of clinical nurses and said, here's the post-assault huddle. This is what we want you to do. And the nurse was like, this is extra work. I don't understand how this is going to benefit me. I don't see why I would put this report in. My patient is just a little bit delirious. It's not a big deal. And now what we've seen is our clinical nurses at the bedside, if they are assaulted, they put in the report and then they seek resolution and they want to be involved in the solution which is really cool to see, because that's what we want. We want those people who are the most impacted by this to engage in the solution. And that's what we're getting.
Host: Yeah. Interesting that you got a little bit of pushback a little bit, but now after seeing the results, it sounds like there's total buy-in. People are engaged with it now. So, yeah, really interesting. Well, I want to thank you both for your time today, Veronica and Trina, but before we go, I'd like to ask, is there anything you'd like to share at all? Trina, let's start with you. Anything you want to share or anything that we missed or you want to add?
Trina: I think I would just like to highlight the importance of the data-driven approach that we have taken at VCU Health. The engagement of team members at all levels has really led us to our success across departments. I think that again, the number of initiatives that we've been able to accomplish in such a short period of time really is the reason why we have seen the success that we've had. Just would like to highlight those items. Thank you so much.
Host: No, absolutely. And Veronica, how about you? Anything else you'd like to add or share?
Veronica: Oh, yeah. You know, I think we could talk about this all day. It's a topic that's near and dear to our hearts, but we would not be anywhere without the committee that we have and the strength of our members. We have representation from safety, security, police, risk management, providers. You name it. If there's a specialty or department, they're on our group and they're helping push these initiatives forward. And we really recognize that it doesn't take one person, it takes a whole group. And so that's what I really think is the biggest thing for us is how you engage leaders and team members from across disciplines really helped us move forward.
Host: Well, gosh, it's been a treat to talk with both of you today. And again, like I said earlier, such an important topic, so great job to both of you and what you've accomplished at VCU, Trina and Veronica, thank you so much for your time today. It's really been a pleasure to have you on.
Veronica: Thank you.
Trina: Absolutely. Thank you for having us.
Host: And once again, that's Veronica Nolden and Trina Trimmer. And for more information, please visit aonl.org. And if you found this podcast helpful, please share it on your social channels and check out the full podcast library for topics of interest to you. This is Today in Nursing Leadership. Thanks for listening.