Southern Coos Hospital & Health Center 2022 Year in Review

“In all, 2022 was one of the most successful years in the history of Southern Coos Hospital & Health Center,” said SCHHC CEO Raymond Hino.

He quickly added that he expects 2023 to be even better.

“The future is bright at Southern Coos Hospital & Health Center,” he said.

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Read about some of the major accomplishments at SCHHC in 2022 in the following Year in Review:

January

• 2 Finalist CEO Candidates interviewed on 1-25-2022.

February

• Hiring decision made on new CEO. Raymond Hino starts as CEO on 2-28-2022.  Hino brings 25 years of experience as a Hospital CEO to Southern Coos Hospital, with the majority of his experience in small and rural hospitals.  He was previously CEO of 3 critical access hospitals in California.  He has extensive experience in rural hospitals, rural health clinics, strategic planning, community engagement, electronic medical record conversions and financial improvement.

• The 19^th Annual Women’s Health Day, held by the Southern Coos Hospital & Health Center and Southern Coos Health Foundation and sponsored by generous community individuals and businesses, was held as a virtual event from 8:00 am to 4:00 pm on 02-26-2022. The free all-day seminar once again featured speakers, demonstrations, exercise/stretch breaks and drawings.  New Hospital CEO, Raymond Hino, was introduced to the Bandon community, as a speaker at the event.  He introduced himself and spoke of his goals for the hospital.

March

• Radiology Services and Mammography Services successfully passed their MQSA certification surveys with zero deficiencies on 3-10-2022

• Post discharge Emergency Department telephone calls were initiated on 3-21-2022. The goal of the calls is to increase ED patient satisfaction and to reduce ED readmission rates.

• SCHHC shows appreciation for our providers on National Doctors Day on 3-30-2022.

• New CEO completes first month of onboarding with 1:1 meetings with all 5 SCHHC Board of Directors, 7 members of SCHHC medical staff, Bandon Chamber of Commerce President and CEO of Coquille Valley Hospital.

April

• Outside consultant, David Sandberg, is brought in to facilitate a Strategic Planning Retreat held on 4-22-2022. The process is an open session public meeting with representatives from medical staff, chamber of commerce, SCHF Foundation Board and included the CEO of Coast Community Health Center.  This was a very transparent process and invited public comment and participation.

• SCHHC participated in a voluntary Risk Assessment survey, conducted by 2 representatives through Physicians Insurance on 4-26-2022 and 4-27-2022. In all, 770 areas of potential risk were reviewed by the survey team.  In general, they were very complimentary of SCHHC for its willingness to seek opportunities for improvement and for management staff engagement in the process.  The management team responded by creating a project team to address all of the identified opportunities.  We are extremely appreciative to Physicians Insurance for conducting this survey.  By undergoing this process and committing to resolve identified concerns, we as a facility were better prepared for our DNV accreditation survey later in the year.”

• New CEO completes second and third month of onboarding with 1:1 meetings with all hospitals in Coos, Curry and Douglas counties, as well as Coast Community Health Center, North Bend Medical Center and Western Oregon Advanced Healthcare Coordinated Care Organization (CCO).

May

• National Hospital Week Celebration, including Board members serving employees a BBQ hamburger and hot dog lunch on 5-11-2022.

• New 3-Year Strategic Plan adopted and approved by Board of Directors on 5-26-2022. The new plan has 215 deliverables in the areas of People, Services, Quality, Growth and Finance.  All goals have an accountable team leader, resources identified and deadline dates.  Deadline dates range from July 2022 to December of 2023 with some deadline dates yet to be identified.  Deliverables in the plan include plans for employee engagement improvements, operational profitability improvements, physician recruitment, future facility improvements planning, new services, and clinic operations improvement.

June

• On 6-20-2022, SCHHC went live with Dialog Health, a 2-way texting program for appointment reminders for our clinic. The new texting reminder system replaced the previous telephone reminder system.  Since implementation of the Dialog Health texting system, we have reached clinic patients by text message 9,394 times.  That is approximately 1,565 successful reminder messages per month.  We received 1,859 responses, including 838 patients that confirmed their appointments and 77 patients that used the system to reschedule their appointments to a new date.  In November of this year, we started using the texting platform for employee text messages.  Usages have included reminders for health insurance open enrollment deadlines, emergency preparedness during high winds and road closures impacting employee commutes.  We anticipate expanding the service in the future for medical imaging, laboratory and respiratory therapy outpatient visits.

• On 6-24-2022 a USDA Civil Rights Survey was conducted by a representative of USDA (US Department of Agriculture). There were a total of 3 findings, including the development of a Limited English Proficiency (LEP) Compliance Plan and a Section 504 Rehabilitation Act of 1973 Self Evaluation and Transition Plan.  The findings of this survey process have been invaluable in SCHHC’s efforts to be more accessible to the handicapped and diverse patient populations that we serve.  As a result, new accessible devices have been implemented and new policies adopted.  The Hospital CEO was invited to become a member of the South Coast Equity Coalition.  We completed all requirements of the Civil Rights survey with Board approval of our Section 504 Self Evaluation and Transition Plan on 11-24-2022.

• The SCHHC Clinical Laboratory underwent its COLA (Commission on Office Laboratory Accreditation) Inspection on 6-21-2022 to 6-23-2022 and successfully passed the survey for accreditation. COLA surveys hospital laboratories on behalf of Federal CLIA and State requirements and grants laboratory accreditation.  The quality management system that COLA utilizes is certified according to ISO 9001 standards.

July

• On 7-7-2022 SCHHC received a new GE High Definition 1.5 Tesla state of the art MRI system Installed in a mobile trailer and located on a new foundation installed at the end of the north wing of the hospital. The trailer that the MRI system was delivered in what was deemed to be less than the original quotation for a trailer that could accommodate larger equipment and would be suitable to provide services for inpatients.  The trailer was traded out for a newer trailer with the larger door and ramp to accommodate inpatients in October of this year.

• On 7-18-2022 we hired Carrie M. Okey to be our new Director of Human Resources. Carrie’s previous experience was as a HR Professional, including HR Director experience for a Federally Qualified Health Center with 350 employees and 12 locations in Wisconsin.  She has over 15 years of management experience, including the last 5 years in health care human resources.  She has been a welcome addition to the Leadership Team of SCHHC, bringing experience, positive HR support for our team and a wealth of knowledge in recruiting.  She has been a key to the transformation of SCHHC as a magnet employer in 2022.

August

• On 8-15-2022 SCHHC hosted Morgan Wardle, an Osteopathic Medical Student who is originally from Gold Beach, Oregon for 2 weeks. Morgan requested a rotation at SCHHC in order to work with the 3 DO physicians at SCHHC (Adams, Mitchell, Pense).  We hope to have Morgan back again in the future to work in our facility.

• On 8-16-2022 a new program entitled Leadership Rounding was initiated by senior leaders at SCHHC. During Leadership Rounding, senior leaders, including all C-Suite leaders and some Department Managers will visit all inpatient, observation and/or swing bed patients to ask a selected set of interview questions designed to determine patient awareness of care planning, family participation in care, and overall satisfaction or critiques of care provided by the SCHHC clinical team.  The results have been overwhelmingly positive.  Patients have reports high levels of satisfaction with services and have expressed appreciation that the leadership of SCHHC cares about what is happening on the front lines of our hospital.

• Before month’s end in 8-2022, SCHHC began contracting with nationally known and endorsed Cybersecurity firm, Critical Insight. Critical Insight began with an August service review which showed no immediate cyber threats to the SCHHC Information Services infrastructure.  They have now conducted a CMS required HIPAA Security Assessment and Cybersecurity Review for our facility.  In the upcoming months, we plan to implement a security awareness program for our entire staff.

September

• SCHHC participated in the 2022 Cranberry Festival with a parade float entry in the Cranberry Festival Parade. Our Hospital CEO and approximately 10 employees and family members were enthusiastically greeted and received along the parade route.

• A long planned community Meet and Greet event for the new Hospital CEO was held on 9-16-2022 at the Farm and Sea marketplace sponsored by the Bandon Chamber of Commerce. The event was well attended by representatives from the medical community (2 representatives from North Bend Medical Center), Hospital Board, business owners and members of the community.  This was a showcase event to inform our community of the recently enacted Strategic Plan and growth initiatives at Southern Coos Hospital.

• The 15^th Annual Southern Coos Health Foundation “Golf for Health Classic Golf Tournament,” was a huge success this year. It started with a Sponsor Recognition Reception on Friday night, 9-16-2022 at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort.  The main event took place on Saturday, 9-17-2022.  We had approximately 120 golfers this year and brought in gross receipts in excess of $50,000.  The event was a success from a fundraising standpoint as well as a PR standpoint as we attracted additional sponsors this year and participation from representatives of Bay Area Hospital, Curry General Hospital and North Bend Medical Center.

• On 9-20-2022 and 9-21-2022, SCHHC was visited by a 3-member DNV survey team to assess our hospital’s compliance with DNV’s National Integrated Accreditation for Healthcare Organization (NIAHO) program. The 3-member survey team included a Clinician, Engineer and an Administrator for a complete CMS accreditation survey, including Life Safety Code compliance.  The result of the 2-day survey was a report of 19 total nonconformities (citations).  They included 6 NC-1 (major) nonconformities and 13 NC-2 (minor) nonconformities.  The fact that we received only 19 citations for a first time survey was a tremendous accomplishment by our SCHHC team.  In particular, our Quality team led by Barbara Snyder did a tremendous job of leading our preparation.  But, in fact, every manager and leader of our organization did a wonderful job of preparation.   We received our survey report from DNV on 10-5-2022.  We had only until 10-15-2022 to respond with a comprehensive plan of corrective action.  That too, was completed on time due to the extraordinary efforts of our team.  Our response was 104 pages long.  It was deemed to be complete by DNV, who accepted our Plan of Correction on 10-25-2022.  On 11-3-2022 we were informed that Southern Coos Hospital & Health Center has been approved for 3-year accreditation by DNV.  This is the first time in the 23-year history of Southern Coos Hospital & Health Center that we have been accredited by an independent accreditation agency.  This is a tremendous accomplishment by our team.  It was not easily accomplished.

• On 9-27-2022 we held our first SCHHC Leadership Academy Session for managers and leaders of Southern Coos Hospital. The topic was Hospital Organization and was led by our Hospital CEO.  We are partnering with National Company, Altius Virtual Training Academy for this program.  All participating managers must complete weekly online training assignments and attend a monthly virtual 1-hour learning session.  We currently have 20 managers in attendance.

October

• On 10-10-2022, due to the need to see more patients in our Multi Specialty Clinic, we brought onboard Temporary Family Nurse Practitioner, Sara Harvison, Family Nurse Practitioner. Sara is originally from Alaska and is Oregon licensed.  She has been extremely helpful in being able to see patients, covering for our providers when they were sick or away from the clinic.  Additionally we have given her patients that are waiting to see a provider, so that we are able to get them in to be seen quicker.  Sara is leaving us on 12-16-2022.  But we have already found a replacement for her.  We have another temporary FNP, named Vincent Tyson, who will start on 1-9-2023.

• On 10-12-2022 we started New Clinic Manager, Dawn Gray, in our clinic. Dawn has moved over to our clinic after having previously served as the Clinic Manager and later Chief Operating Officer at Coast Community Health Center.  Dawn brings a wealth of knowledge in Rural Clinic operations, including her previous experience at CCHC.  She has been very well accepted by the clinic staff and our hospital team and is a welcome addition.  With Dawn’s experience, we plan to finally initiate the Medicare Care Coordination program that we have been waiting months to start.  Care Coordination is a very financially successful program that can be implemented with clinical skills sets that are provided by nurses and clinic providers.

November

• SCHHC implemented the first phase of our new Picture Archiving & Communications System (PACS) on 11-1-2022 for echocardiography image capture and interpretation, called Nova Cardio. The new PACS system was necessary because the old system, which was shared with Coquille Valley Hospital was no longer going to be supported as of 11-1-2022.  The new system offers new technology for image storage that should serve our hospital well for many years to come.

• Our Rural Health Clinic (RHC) Feasibility Analysis completed and presented to our Board of Directors on 11-14-2022. The analysis was completed by the Accounting and Consulting firm of Wipfli, a National firm that specializes in supporting rural hospitals, critical access hospitals and rural health clinics.  The analysis showed that even with current depressed Medicare rates awarded to hospital-based rural health clinics, that a RHC would, over time, be expected to bring in more Medicare and Medicaid revenue.  However the negative effect on the Medicare Cost Report for our hospital (as a Critical Access Hospital) in drawing reimbursable expense away from our hospital, would result in a substantial net loss for our hospital.  Therefore, the final conclusion was that, at this time, it does not make financial sense to convert our hospital owned clinic into a rural health clinic.

• DAISY (Diseases Attacking the Immune System) International Nursing Recognition Program for Extraordinary Nurses started at SCHHC on 11-22-2022. This is a 20-year old internationally recognized program, currently used in over 550 hospitals around the world to recognize nurses who demonstrate extraordinary clinical and compassionate patient care.  We are very happy to be able to bring this program to SCHHC.  The program kicked off at SCHHC on 11-22.  We are currently accepting nominations for our first DAISY award winner.  Nominations are de-identified, so that our panel of judges does not know the names of the nominees.  We plan to select 1 nurse, either RN or LPN, to name as our first winner in early 2023.

December

• On 12-31-2022 we will be ready to make a change on Emergency Department Physician Staffing companies from current company, Western Healthcare, to new company OPYS (Our Physicians Your Success). We selected OPYS to be our new staffing company because of their focus on establishing core physician staffing models in small hospitals in the Pacific Northwest.  The CEO of OPYS is an Emergency Department Physician, Dr. Andre Creese, who was here in Bandon on 11-28-2022 to meet with SCHHC staff and physicians.  We have been working diligently and in a very organized manner for 2 months now with weekly meetings to plan for this transition and onboarding of a new group.  This new contract will save our hospital money from what we would have paid if we stayed with Western Healthcare.  We will be able to keep many of the same doctors that have worked here and like it here, and they will be supplemented by new doctors that are looking forward to coming to Bandon.