Bill Klaproth (host): Welcome to the ASHRM Podcast, made possible by the American Society For healthcare risk management to support efforts to advance safe and trusted healthcare through enterprise risk management. You can visit ashrm.org, that's A-S-H-R-M.org/membership, to learn more and to become an ASHRM member. I'm Bill klaproth.

On this podcast, it's another healthcare risk professional journey as we talk with Rodney Melton, the Manager of Patient Safety and Clinical Risk Management at Parkland Health and Hospital System in Dallas. Rodney, welcome.

Rodney Melton: Thanks, Bill. Thanks for having me on.

Host: Absolutely. It's great to talk with you and I love hearing these stories how people have gotten into risk management. So, could you start off by telling us how you found your way into risk management?

Rodney Melton: Well, like most people that I've ever met that is a clinical risk manager, I didn't graduate college knowing I was going to be in risk management. Actually, when I was in college, I was working as a lifeguard and was seeing scuba divers that were working coming to the pool where I was working at and got to spend some time with them, most of them were EMTs. And so, I got interested in that part of healthcare. And kind of during my experience in scuba diving and working as EMT, they talk a lot about risk management in there. That's probably the first time I ever heard the term. And so when I was going through nursing school, I had this idea in my head of how do you manage problems or how do you manage risk? I became a nurse. I graduated with my Bachelor's in Nursing and worked in ICUs and emergency rooms and eventually decided that I liked teaching people and wanting to help share anything that I had learned and became a nurse educator.

And during my time as a nurse educator, I was encouraged to get my Master's degree. I did a master's internship. And during that time, I spent some time with a risk manager, the first time I ever met a risk manager at a hospital. And coming out of that experience, I really thought that this is what I want to do. And I was given the opportunity back in 2009 to become a risk manager, didn't know what I was getting into, didn't really know much about the profession, just the little experience that I had during that internship. And I've been working in Risk Management and Patient Safety ever since.

Host: Wow, that's a great story. I love that, how you worked as an EMT. Can you tell us how has that influenced your work in risk management today?

Rodney Melton: If you can think of what I did as an EMT, as we were dealing with interruptions in people's lives, people didn't call 911 when they were having a good day, they had to call 911 that something went wrong. You may experience something like that if you have a flat tire on your car. And what we did is that we managed that problem to say, "Well, what are we going to do about it?" And that was my real first understanding of management of risk. And if you've got a flat tire, well, you may say, Well, I'm going to pull off to the side of the road, I'm going to get the spare tire out of my trunk, and I'm going to try to change the flat." But that management of the risk doesn't start at the time that it actually happens. When you do regular maintenance on your car, you may check to make sure that the air in that spare is all there, it's aired up like it needs to be. You may make sure that you've got tools in your car so you can change your tire.

And so. Risk management can be proactive or reactive. And proactive is that you're prepared for when the risk comes. Because you think what could go wrong and how can we prepare for it when it does come. Or it can be reactive where you think, "Hey, this happened, now what?" And sometimes those are the ones that are a little bit more challenging. And as an EMT, we helped people when they were dealing with those usually reactive risk when something was happening, and how do you deal with it to help improve it? And lots of times, we had to get them to the hospital as quickly as possible. And that's a lot of what we do as risk managers in healthcare.

Host: Well, that's really interesting how your work as an EMT has carried over into your current profession. So, let me ask you this. I know that ASHRM has been very beneficial to many, many people. When and how did you first get involved with ASHRM?

Rodney Melton: When I got my first job in risk management back in 2009, I had some great leaders that I was working for. And one of the things that they were doing is the Vice President of Patient Safety and Risk Management where I was working was actually the president of the local ASHRM chapter in the North Texas area. And she says, You're going to start coming to these meetings that we're having," and encouraged me to and helped me go to ASHRM courses, like the healthcare risk management one, the Essentials Course, so I could learn all the things that you need to know about being a risk manager. There's some things that you go to your job every day and you learn what you're kind of doing as it comes along, but you have that narrow focus. And going through the ASHRM education helped me get a broader focus to understand what I needed to do as a risk manager and what the profession entailed and so that there was no blind spot, so to speak, that I was missing when I was taking care of my customers, which is the healthcare leaders in my organization, to make sure that I was looking at all the areas.

And so ASHRM, by being involved in local chapters, It's helped me with my education and preparing me for my job. Because I went to school to be a nurse, and my master's degree was in healthcare administration. I didn't take risk management classes and there really wasn't a lot of formal education for that. And so, ASHRM filled that gap. Also, being involved in the local chapter and at the national level has helped me connect with other risk managers so that when I do have concerns or questions or problems, I've got someone to reach out to and a community that I can talk to and learn from each other and help each other along when we're reaching those new challenges.

Host: I like how you say it helped fill in the blind spots and the gaps, and it really is great for networking, as you mentioned, Rodney, that connection with other risk managers, that community that has fostered within ASHRM. So, thank you for sharing that with us. And you were talking about the woman that brought you to that first ASHRM meeting. It sounds like she made a big difference in your career. Along with her, is there anyone else that's made a difference in your career?

Rodney Melton: Her name was Marcie Williams and she made a wonderful difference in my career. But it wasn't just her, it was kind of that whole team that I got started with. It was Marcie Williams, Faye Sheppard, there was a gentleman named Tony Hill, Michelle Hudson, Denise Chreene, all these other risk managers that we worked with as a team. And together, that support that we had really helped out. And even though I don't work with them anymore, I actually was speaking with Denise yesterday, I spoke with Tony today, I texted Faye a week ago. These are individuals that those relationships have been established, we still talk with each other. You know, Denise was asking me about policy or process. How do we do this? What are my thoughts on this? And what has really made a difference is that those lasting relationships and those connections and about how we hold each other up when we're struggling through our day to day lives.

Host: Well, really good stuff, and it's important for people to hear the connections that you've made and how those connections in that community has helped you and these individual people. So, that's really good stuff. So then, what would your advice be to someone early on in their risk management career?

Rodney Melton: Ask for help. Make those connections and to really understand that what we're doing isn't rocket science. It is helping people to get to the other side of a problem. And, you know, I used the example earlier of a flat tire. In healthcare, it's not a flat tire. It may be a heart attack. It may be a medical mistake and our customers that we may be helping, it may be the patient, but it may not be the patient. It may be the physician. It may be the nurse. It may be the nurse manager that's dealing with a stressful situation. And our role is to help them get through that on the other side and to recover them as an individual, if it was their health that was at jeopardy, to help them recover as professionals so that they don't get burned out, that they don't decide that, "Hey, I don't know that I can do this anymore," to help them stay in their career, to help them move along.

In the current role that I work, another one of the risk managers on my team because of the experience that she had with a risk manager when she was dealing with an event, she decided, "Hey, I want to go into risk management. Because the same way that I helped people at the bedside as a nurse, I can help nurses and leaders and physicians and patients by being a risk manager."

Host: Well, that's good advice for all of us, Rodney. Ask for help. And like you said, it really comes down to helping people get to the other side of the problem. So, do you now encourage people in risk management to get involved on both a national and local level in both ASHRM and their local risk management chapter?

Rodney Melton: Yeah. Matter of fact, I do. I am active in my local chapter here in Texas. And it is the networking, but it's also educational activities. This next month, the first week in March, our local chapter here is having an education event where people are going to be getting together. We're going to be learning about common things, and it's people from different healthcare organizations from all over the state that's going to be meeting.

But then also, especially early in your career, take the advantage of the courses that ASHRM provides, whether it's a monthly webinar, or going to ASHRM Academy, or ASHRM Express, or going to the pre-conference, or going to the conference. And lots of times, what I hear people say is like, "It's going to cost $30 to do that webinar," or "It's going to cost so much money to go to the conference." They wouldn't have thought twice about investing that in their education when it was at a college or a university or something else. This is equivalent to that in your career when it comes to the education in becoming a risk professional in patient safety and risk management. I would really say invest in yourself. Invest in your education because that's something you can take with you no matter where you go. It'll help you be better as a risk professional. But if you spend time as a risk professional and decide, "Well, you know, I want to go back to the bedside. Maybe I want to go be a chief nursing officer or go into hospital leadership as a chief operating officer," what you'll learn in risk management and in the courses that ASHRM teaches, or even in the networking that you get by making connections, it'll help you be a better leader in those other areas too.

Host: Yeah, I like that. Invest in yourself and invest in your education. So, let me ask you this. What ASHRM committee did you enjoy being on the most and why?

Rodney Melton: There's a committee that I actually support right now. I was on it as a member. I am actually on the committee as the board liaison now, and that's our Educational and Scholarship Committee. And ASHRM is committed to helping people make it to these educational offerings, whether they don't have all the financial ability or their organization can't support them. And there is a certain number of scholarships that ASHRM can provide. So, what this committee does is they take those scholarship submissions, review them, and this is really kind of the hard part. It's like picking your favorite child. You can't do it, but what we have to do is we have to sort through there and say, "Well, who can we help out the most right now, to get them to either an education session or a conference session," either to help them as a new person that is new into patient safety and clinical risk management; someone that is a growing professional that has been in a couple years, but needs to take some extra courses or maybe prepare for their certification; or that leader that needs to take that next step towards their Fellow or their Distinguished Fellow in ASHRM. And what this committee does is help provide that opportunity for them.

Host: Absolutely. Well, this has really been interesting, Rodney. It's been fun learning about your journey to becoming a risk manager and your involvement with ASHRM, all good stuff. Before we wrap up, is there anything else you want to add?

Rodney Melton: Well, I think that just like when you go to work, your hospital, health system, or probably any employer that you ever worked with probably has a mission or vision that they follow to help them get up in the morning and say, "Hey, what are we going to do and to decide what is the next best thing to do." And I think it's very important that when you go into a profession like risk management, even whether it was me as an EMT, or when I was a bedside nurse is that sometimes you see things are not enjoyable, you see things that are the bad parts of healthcare, you see it when people are injured, or when a medical mistake happens, or when, you know, there's a lawsuit, is that you have to have that mission and vision to tie yourself to. For myself personally, I'm a Christian, and I tie myself to my faith, and my mission is about loving others. And so, I've anchored myself in that. So when I get up in the morning, I know that my mission is to help others and to help them through their day and recover them. And I think it's important just like your employer, I guarantee they've got a mission and vision, is that you have to have one of those two.

Host: Really good stuff. Rodney, thank you so much for your time. This has really been interesting and informative. Thank you again.

Rodney Melton: All right. Thank you so much, Bill. I appreciate you having me on today.

Host: You bet. And once again, that's Rodney Melton. And the ASHRM Podcast was made possible by the American Society for Healthcare Risk Management to support efforts to advance safe and trusted healthcare through enterprise risk management. You can visit ashrm.org/membership to learn more and to become an ASHRM member.

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