BY EMILY SINGH
“To keep the body in good health is a duty…otherwise we will not be able to keep our minds strong and clear”- Buddha
In the quest to keep our bodies in optimal health we often times forget our health care providers who work in the ambulatory care setting who go above and beyond to ensure patient satisfaction. What exactly is ambulatory care? Ambulatory care can be defined as medical care that is provided on an outpatient basis which includes but is not limited to diagnosis, rehabilitation, consultation, observation and of course treatment.
The Canadian Association of Ambulatory Care (CAAC) is the first and only interprofessional association that focuses solely on patients who require either medical or surgical care on an outpatient basis. On May 13th,, 2016 inside the luxurious Westin Prince Hotel, the CAAC held their fourth annual conference geared towards “The Patient Experience in Ambulatory Care: Striving for Excellence.” Chief Executive Officer and founder, Denyse Henry took to the podium first to address the audience and introduce the new president of the CAAC, Jatinder Bains. This interactive forum touched upon key topics such as ethics, patient relations, efficiency, customer service, case costing and patient flow.
The opening keynote address was given by Dr. Joshua Tepper who is a family physician and president and CEO of Health Quality Ontario. Following Dr. Tepper was a session regarding the integration of patient relations and ethics services. Ethics plays a tremendous role in the healthcare field especially when dealing with the relationship between patients and health care providers. In the Caribbean community one major topic of interest is cultural sensitivity and cultural tailoring. In delivering patient care, accommodation is key in establishing trust and comfort. For many, receiving treatment and care can often times can be a stressful experience hence the need for building these relationships between patient and health care providers.
In today’s day and age, technology has proven to be a force to be reckoned with. Everything is digitally driven and traditional means of healthcare treatment has been revolutionized. Barbara Collins, CEO of Humber River Hospital along with Jerry Jeter, Vice President of Healthcare Principal HDR Architecture Associates Inc. led a discussion on how digitalization has begun to drive a new standard for ambulatory care at Humber River Hospital. As North America’s first digital hospital, Humber River Regional Hospital is a state of the art facility that has been constructed in such a way that further enhances efficiency and decreases walking distance amongst nurses which in turn ensures maximum bedside assistance.
Other information sessions during the conference included: Transition to Electronic Scheduling & Documentation, Future Practice, Consideration in the Ambulatory Care Setting, The Starbucks Affect-Goal: Customer Service Excellence, Evaluating the Efficiency of Patient Flows in an Endoscopy Suite, TrackOR- Implementing RFID Information Solutions the Improve Operational Performance, Help! What is Happening to Me? Improving the Patient Care-Partner Experience Dementia Care, Striving for Excellence in Interprofessional Vascular Access Education. Use of Games as a Creative and Effective Strategy for Knowledge Transfer Across an Organization, Care Coordination: The Impact of a Collaborative Approach of a Healthcare Transition of Patients in a Tertiary Setting, Case Costing in the Patient Journey, Tele-Ophthalmology and the Patient Experience in Ambulatory Care, Developing & Implementing a Patient Centered Interprofessional Cardiovascular & Pulmonary Rehab Program, How Case Costing Information Can Support? and lastly Promoting Excellence in Ambulatory Care: The Role of Advanced Practice Nursing Within the Interprofessional Team.
The conferences closing remarks keynote address was given by Haesun Moon who is the Certificate Program Director of Solution-Focused Brief Coaching Program & Organizational Development Leadership Association at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre. For more information regarding the Canadian Association of Ambulatory Care please visit www.canadianambulatorycare.com.
