With football season in high gear, many of you will be anxiously glued to your electronic devices cheering on our Houston Texans and their new quarterback. But, what does football have to do with Texas Children’s safety coaches?
Well, have you ever had a coach who ignited your passion for a sport, motivated you to push forward to achieve a goal or helped you become a better team player? That’s exactly what Texas Children’s safety coaches are all about. Just like a football team works together to score a touchdown, safety coaches help us reach our organization-wide goal: scoring multiple touchdowns in the “zero patient harm” end zone.
Every Texas Children’s employee – regardless of their job title or position – plays an important role in cultivating a harm-free environment for our patients. While all employees are required to complete error prevention training, Texas Children’s Safety Coach Program takes that training to a whole new level.
Safety coaches consist of clinical and nonclinical frontline staff and providers who are trained to observe employee interactions and provide feedback that reinforces safety behaviors and skills taught in error prevention training. These safety behaviors include how to effectively communicate concerns requiring action, how to support a questioning attitude and how to use three-way communication to achieve greater clarity.
“While all of us have been trained to use error prevention tools, it takes more than a single training session to hardwire these safety behaviors into our culture,” said Texas Children’s Patient Safety Specialist Sharon Jacobson. “Our safety coaches help us integrate proven safety behaviors in our everyday work to ensure error prevention alertness and personal accountability are always top of mind.”
Here’s an example of a safety coach at work:
“A safety coach working in the operating room observes an anesthesiologist express a concern about the volume of medication in a syringe. Because the anesthesiologist voices her concern, the team pauses before giving medication to the patient. They discover the wrong calculation had been used to prepare the medication. An error has been prevented. The safety coach provides the anesthesiologist and the care team with positive feedback for fostering a questioning attitude and preventing a potentially harmful patient safety event.”
So, you might be wondering, “How do I become a safety coach?”
As part of the recruitment process, Texas Children’s Patient Safety Team reaches out to departmental leaders across the organization to determine who on their team would be an ideal candidate based on the responsibilities and attributes outlined in the safety coach application packet. Once the forms are filled out, signed by the applicants and approved by their manager, the Patient Safety Team selects the candidates for the training program.
Safety coaches are required to take a mandatory 3-hour training course that includes an overview of the skills taught in error prevention training, a discussion on the attributes that embody a good safety coach and video scenarios that help safety coaches identify good versus not so good coaching moments. Since the program’s launch in February, Texas Children’s has more than 60 safety coaches across the organization, who all serve on a strictly volunteer basis.
“We’ve completed training sessions at Main Campus and West Campus, and are looking to get our first physician group going this month,” said Texas Children’s Patient Safety Specialist Tiffany Wrenn. “As you can see, our safety coaches play a vital role in helping all of our employees become Safety Super Stars.”
