At fall Nursing Summit, the Unit Based Councils and Nursing Shared Governance Committees come together to vision the future of Shared Governance

Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital’s Department of Nursing recently gathered chairpersons from each of the Unit Based Councils, Nursing Shared Governance Committees and the APP Council for their annual fall summit meeting. The summit is designed to develop leadership skills, share examples of unit- or committee-level practice improvements and engage clinical nurses in the development of the Department of Nursing’s Strategic Goals.

At the start of the summit, Cori Loescher, MM, BSN, RN, NEA-BC, Chief Nursing Officer and Vice President of Patient Care Services, reviewed the 2021 Nursing Strategic Goals with participants. “Even though it was a challenging year, it was really a positive year in terms of what we were able to achieve,” she said. “We were able to accomplish most of our goals despite caring for higher acuity patients and an increased volume. You can feel proud that this was a good year.”

After reviewing the 2021 accomplishments, participants spent time in small groups to provide feedback on BWFH’s 2022 Strategic Goals and nursing priorities. Loescher and nursing leadership will use this feedback to finalize the 2022 Nursing Strategic Plan.

The summit included updates from each of the Unit Based Councils and Shared Governance Committees. Joanne Hallahan, BSN, RN, and Sarah Munier, MSN, RN, CEN, shared the Emergency Department Unit Based Council’s work, “Behind the Curtain,” which aims to reduce noise in the busy ED. Clinical Leader Jacqueline Dejean, RN, BSN, and Monica Pina, RN, BSN, shared the 7 North Unit Based Council’s efforts to consistently perform bedside shift reports utilizing a standardized tool. This improvement, and inclusion of patients in bedside reports, is aimed at improving outcomes such as decreasing patient fall rates and addressing call bell fatigue.

Participants shared their thoughts on the impact this day will have on their professional practice. One said the summit “helps inspire ideas and projects to start on the unit and helps us to better understand struggles on other units (and) get to know our peers.” Another said, “I am excited to bring back to my unit all I have learned today and hopefully instill excitement in my peers to continue to strive for ways to meet the best patient outcomes.”

As a final reflection, Loescher shared her thoughts, “We are still in a pandemic, in the middle of staffing crisis and dealing with a high patient census, but, despite those challenges, I think the future is bright. This is important work, it’s who we are and that’s why we are a Magnet organization. You are all committed to doing the work of providing the highest quality care to our patients despite the struggles we are currently facing.”