Cookeville Regional creating a centralized internal resource guide to address non-medical needs like food, clothing and transportation for patients transitioning back to their communities.
CEO Buffy Key told Trustees Thursday the hospital’s mission of building healthier communities extends beyond the medical treatment provided within the facility’s walls. Key said the organization follows a specific process to identify and manage social drivers of health that affect patients after they are discharged.
“Our mission statement is building healthier communities,” Key said. “I want the community to know that we do not just take care of patients inside our four walls. When they come in with needs or social drivers of health, there is a process that we take to make sure that we’re taking care of them outside of our institution.”
Director of Patient Experience Craig Norris said Key challenged his department to better support patients with the struggles they see on a daily level. Norris said the hospital partnered with case management and the Cookeville Regional Medical Center Foundation to develop an internal intranet site linked with Find Help. Norris said the searchable database allows staff to find real-time information on available resources by county or specific area.
“We decided before we move forward with any initiatives, let’s really work towards developing an internal centralized guide that can kind of guide us through all of the available resources,” Norris said. “We partnered with the IT department, added this to our internal intranet site, linked it with Find Help and made it searchable.”
Norris said the hospital identifies priorities through data and patient interviews, focusing on food insecurity, clothing needs at discharge, transportation, and hygiene. Norris said the food backpack program provides patients with seven days of non-perishable items and connects them with resources in their specific home communities.
“When the patient gets the backpack, the liaison also determines what community they’re going back to, uses our internal resource guide tailored to that community and helps connect them with available resources once they get back to their community,” Norris said.
Norris said the hospital also expanded a clothing program to provide outfits based on weather and established a transportation initiative that offers reduced-fee or free rides for follow-up care. Key said addressing these inequities is a way to be proactive since these issues often contribute to the patient’s initial hospitalization.
“It truly is a blessing for all of us to be able to do this for our patients because a lot of these social drivers of health are what got our patients here in the situation that they were in to start with,” Key said. “So it’s preventive medicine for us.”
In other business, the board approved the appointment of Brad Horner, Christie Wagner, Dr. Hunter Lambert, and Jim Jolly to the Cookeville Regional Medical Center Foundation Board. The board also approved the purchase of two anesthesia machines totaling $115,000.
