When you’re a patient at the hospital or visiting a loved one,
you likely have face-to-face contact with doctors, nurses and
other medical professionals. But the clearly visible work
performed at CalvertHealth is just the tip of the iceberg.
Entire teams work to ensure daily operations at the hospital
run smoothly and patients have a safe experience. Take a
peek into the day-to-day lives of some of the hospital’s unsung
heroes – the people working diligently behind the scenes.
Infection Control Starts with Central Sterile Processing
Becki Jenkins, central sterile processing supervisor, manages a small but mighty
team who are responsible for every instrument in the building that has to be used on
a patient, ensuring supplies are sterilized. Central Sterile Processing is also involved
in infection control processes, water quality processes and use instructions for
equipment.
“Patients will never know your name and will never know what you did to make
sure they had a safe experience,” Jenkins said. “They appreciate you, but they don’t
know it’s you they appreciate.”
Infection control begins and ends with sterile processing. If an instrument is
contaminated, everything is contaminated. It’s a lot of responsibility to provide
sterilized instruments across the entire hospital from the operating room to the
emergency room one hundred percent of the time. In fact, the national average for
central sterile errors is five percent. CalvertHealth’s average is 0.01 percent –
98 to 99 percent lower than most other healthcare facilities in the country!
Sterilization isn’t just pressing a button – there are five processes before
equipment gets to the washers and four or five chemicals involved. Each piece
of equipment has a different protocol. It takes five hours to sterilize a set of
surgical instruments.
Jenkins said she is especially proud of her team during the height of COVID-19.
Because of COVID, additional procedures had to be developed and additional
chemicals used. During the shortages for masks and other protective equipment, the
team had to process single-use masks. “Our little community hospital came up with
a plan and did testing to make sure it was safe for our patients and our workforce.
Our protocols ended up being utilized in other hospitals as far as New York City.”
Keeping the Lights On
A team of 13 individuals provide
24/7 service to maintain the physical
environment of the hospital. If
something needs fixed, this is the team
that gets it done! The Plant Operations
Department is responsible for all
electrical services, HVAC, plumbing,
power plant operation, fire and life
safety and general maintenance of
buildings and grounds. They make
sure the lights are on, the water is
running, the heat or air conditioning is
functioning and the facilities at Calvert
Health are maintained.
“We are the behind-the-scenes
people who make sure the environment
you stay in is like a four-star hotel,”
said Stuart Simmons, plant operations
supervisor. It’s crucial to ensure there’s
someone available to respond to every
incid ent at all hours of the day or night.
Simmons’ team must coordinate
with other teams to ensure their work
doesn’t interfere with patient care.
During the height of COVID-19, the
medical staff and the plant operations
staff worked to minimize the time Plant
Operations’ teams spent in rooms of
COVID-positive patients when there
were issues that needed attention in
their rooms.
COVID also impacted how the team
handles preventative maintenance of the
heating, ventilation, and air conditioning
(HVAC) systems for the hospital. The
team wears protective gloves and masks when working on rooftop exhaust
fans, for example.
“I feel very fortunate I can help the
community this way,” Simmons said.
The plant operations team prides itself
on having a family-like atmosphere,
where every one pitches in as needed
and has each other’s backs.
Treating You Like Family
When a Patient Care Technician like
Brittney Johnson enters a patient’s
room for a routine vitals check,
there’s a lot more happening in
Johnson’s mind than patients know
about. During that routine check,
Johnson checks respiration and
conducts a head-to-toe assessment
to determine if there’s any changes
which she needs to let the nurse
know about.
“I do this because I love taking
care of people,” Johnson said. “It’s
not just a job to me, it’s my career;
it’s my passion.”
Johnson helps patients with daily
activities like bathing, taking them to
the bathroom, taking vitals, checking
blood sugars, taking them for tests,
performing CPR when needed and
is at the bedside to help nurses and
doctors perform bedside procedures.
A major distinction between a Patient
Care Technician and a nurse is that
Patient Care Technicians do not
administer medication.
COVID-19 required Johnson to relearn
how to do her job since protocols
were rapidly changing. She says she
spent more time during COVID with
patients – conversing with them and
being present – to let them know they
were loved and cared for while in the
hospital. Johnson recalls a patient
who hated being alone, so she would
go in once an hour and watch TV
and hold her hand. “I knew I had to
make time to do that because if it was
my family member in the hospital, I
would hope and pray that someone
would sit with them,” Johnson said. “I
treat my patients as if they were my
own family members.”
A Vital Link to Quality Outcomes
Sometimes referred to as housekeeping or
janitorial services, environmental services
(EVS) is a term used exclusively in
healthcare to describe the process highly
trained support service staff conduct to
clean and disinfect medical equipment,
patient rooms and other common areas
within the hospital setting.
EVS technicians ensure a safe
environment for everyone in the facility.
They work closely with clinical staff and
frequently interact with patients.
“We give it 100 percent every day.
We do the work and make sure it’s done
right,” said William Stepney who has
been with the EVS team at CalvertHealth
for almost 10 years. He added, “We take
a lot of pride in keeping our hospital
nice and clean for our patients and their
families.” Primarily assigned to the OR,
Stepney is one of the technicians trained
to use the Surfacide UV disinfection
system which uses three towers and
laser mapping technology to ensure
all surfaces have been
effectively cleaned and
sterilized. CalvertHealth
has been utilizing the
technology for more than
eight years.
A detailed EVS
training process, such as
the one implemented at
CalvertHealth, ensures
the EVS staff knows
the importance of their
role and the established
safety standards and
regulations that should be followed - whether it’s using cleaning
products or handling body fluids/
preventing infection transmission.
And according to Stepney, the team at
CalvertHealth is the best at what they do.
“I’ll brag just a little. I think we are
the best in our area. Not only do we keep
everything clean, we are courteous to
patients and try to assist everyone we
come in contact with. It’s a good feeling
to help people,” said Stepney.
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