1.PATIENT AND FAMILY ADVISORY COUNCIL
1.1 What is Patient and Family Advisory Council?
It represents a cooperation based on a joint wisdom where healthcare professionals, patients and patient relatives understand and try to provide for the requirements, preferences and expectations of each other to improve care experiences while also considering origins of the health services.
1.2 Goals of Patient and Family Advisory Council
- Encouragement of Person-Centered Care Principles.
- Designing educational resources that may be beneficial in decision-making processes of the patients and their relatives.
- Sharing of information from the perspective of patients and patient relatives on presentation of patient care and healthcare services.
- Formation of projects that may improve patient, relative and employee experience.
- Having members of Patient and Family Advisory Council participate in committees of the hospital.
- Having Patient and Family Advisory Council regularly provide information to Person-Centered Care Application Committee.
- Having Patient and Family Advisory Council submit an annual activity report that summarizes yearly actions of the committee and their outcomes.
- Having Patient and Family Advisory Council make recommendations for the next term.
1.3 Who are the members of Patient and Family Advisory Council?
Patient and Family Advisory Council consists of;
- Patients and relatives, who received healthcare services from American Hospital.
- Clinic and non-clinic hospital personnel, depending on the subject of the meeting
- Chief Doctor of American Hospital, Clinical Leaders of Person Centered Care, Person Centered Care Coordinator.
1.4 Duties and Responsibilities of
Patient and Family Advisory Council
Patient / Relative
- Regularly participating in all meetings of Patient and Family Advisory Council
- Providing thoughts on subjects and ideas discussed in each meeting in a constructive way
- Respecting experiences and point of view of each member
- Being proactive in process development and providing creative ideas for change
Hospital Personnel;
- Regularly participating in all meetings of Patient and Family Advisory Council
- Contributing on preparation of meeting agenda
- Planning, invitation and management of patients and relatives who may become members of Patient and Family Advisory Council
- Actively participating in discussions of the Committee and ensuring cooperation between all members
- Providing feedback to the Patient and Family Advisory Council regarding progresses on projects that are in the agenda of the Committee.
- Assisting Patient and Family Advisory Council to reach its identified goals by eliminating or minimizing potential obstacles.
- Assisting completion of the process by working with Hospital Management.
1.5 Patient and Family Advisory Council, Examples of Agenda Items and Projects
Items of the meeting agenda are prepared by the Person -Centered Care Coordinator and presented to the members before each meeting.
Examples Of Projects That May Be Considered;
- Training or other information/materials for the patients
- Communication tools
- Visitor Policy
- Faculty improvements
- Communication regarding waiting periods/delays in Emergency Service and other waiting areas
- Methods for decreasing noise
- Direction signs
- New menus
- Design of new areas
- Additional ideas for improving patient and family experience
1.6 Confidentiality Policy
Confidentiality Agreement of Patient and Family Advisory Council, which consists of patients who are receiving treatment in Vehbi Koç Foundation Health Institutions American Hospital and administrators of various offices in the hospital, undertakes and commits to respect esteem and privacy of patients and protect confidentiality regarding all information on patient care. American Hospital and all committee members accept, declare and undertake that the guarantees mentioned above will be valid indefinitely in accordance with the requirements of Law on Protection of Personal Date (KVKK) regardless of termination of their memberships.
In the event where a member of Patient and Family Advisory Council, commits an action that breeches these rules and continues to act contrary to provisions of KVKK, memberships of the said individuals are terminated.
1.7 Patient and Family Advisory Council Letter of Invitation and Application Process
Dear Patient and Family,
As American Hospital we enter into a new period for improving care processes of our patients and focusing healthcare from your eyes. You are the most important member of the patient care. Therefore, we think that your cooperation may be a significant contribution to this formation and we believe that, together, we may achieve greater things. We invite you to become a member of Patient and Family Advisory Council to make a difference and to support each other along the entire processes.
Our cooperation;
Patient and Family Advisory Council guarantees that patients/patient relatives have a say in improvement of healthcare, treatments and services. At the same time it creates a unique opportunity for us to form a partnership with you by strengthening following relations to provide for requirements of our patients and their relatives.
- Achieving perfection in care service with patients/patient relatives and healthcare personnel.
- Developing a policy-program in accordance with values, believes, preferences and cultural values of patients and their relatives in all processes, planning precautionary trainings.
- Developing transparent, objective, correct and timely methods to share information for minimizing emotions such as anxiety and fear experienced by the patients and their relatives.
We thank you for your interest in providing assistance regarding improvement of the human-centered care that we provide for our patients.
Chief Doctor, American Hospital
We invite you to an interview with our Coordinator of Person Centered Care via the address and contact number provided to you for admission, if you desire to become a member of the committee.
2.CARE PARTNER PROGRAM
Care Partner Program in American Hospital;
Encourages providing families, friends and loved ones of the patients with an opportunity to give assistance in the care service, starting from the admission of the patients.
The purpose is to preserve the level of comfort that our patients are familiar with in their own home during the hospitalization period and minimize the differences during patient experience. We attach importance to maintaining the care for our patients after they are discharged from the hospital and care partners having sufficient information and skills to maintain the care at home environment.
2.1 What is Care Partner?
Care partners are family members or friends who are determined by the patient, accepted as a member of the care team, authorized regarding responsibilities of patient care in certain stages of the determined care plan and have a mutual care agreement with professional members of care team.
2.2 What Are The Benefits Of Being A Care Partner?
Benefits of the care partnership are related to the shared decision-making in diagnosis and treatment process by establishing communication with the patients and their relatives, improved patient satisfaction and providing quality care at home environment after discharge.
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Trained care partners; ensure that the visitors comply with proper hand hygiene, quickly intervene on the subject of notifying proper individuals when they recognize a worrying change in patient's status or in the event that they have concerns regarding quality of the patient care.
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Trained care partners; may ease hard decisions and arguments. They encourage keeping the spirit of an actual partnership within the family, transparency, open communication and mutual trust.
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Trained care partners; are able to speak on the behalf of the patient on the subjects of unintelligible information and procedures, understanding side effects of medications and in the event of negative reactions.
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Trained care partners; provide assistance in decreasing the amount of information requests made by multiple family members and adverse security issues such as falling (care partner acts as a central spokesperson who manages these issues).
3. OPEN VISITS WITH PATIENT’S PREFERENCE
3.1 Visitor Acceptance in Inpatient Floors and Special Units – In Coronary Intensive Care (CIC) – In Neonatal Intensive Care (NIC) – In General Surgery Intensive Care (GIC)
- Visitations are allowed 24 hours/7 days for the relatives specified by the patients if there is no medical restriction.
- In the event of excessive amount of visitors being present, adverse effects of the situation on the patient’s health are explained and patient relatives are informed on the subject of decreasing the number of visitors.
- It is ensured that the visitors comply with the visitation restrictions which may be applied depending on the patient-specific conditions (patient's/physician's refusal of visitors, isolation etc.).
- It is ensured that the privacy of the patient is preserved.
- Visitation hours are limited in accordance with the patient’s preferences.
- Visitors are cautioned to avoid speaking in loud voices and watching television loudly in such way that it may disturb the patients.
- Use of necessary Personal Protection Materials in accordance with intensive care conditions is ensured.
- Visitors are accepted to intensive care units in such manner that they are supervised by the healthcare personnel in-charge and other patients are not concerned or disturbed to avoid delays in monitoring and treatment of the patients and to ensure safety of the patients.
- Individuals who are infected with contagious diseases or those who are known to have come in to contact with such individuals, individuals with symptoms suggestive of respiratory tract infection such as cough, sneezing, sore throat and runny nose are not accepted as visitors.
- Restrictions regarding visitation may be implemented by the hospital administration if there is an increase in prevalence of infectious diseases in the community.
4. SHARE OF OPEN MEDICAL RECORDS
Shared medical record: This describes patients having real-time access to personal healthcare information during care and treatment.
Open Medical Records, are records that are continuously updated during admission and treatment of the patient. Medical Records are accepted as closed after patients are discharged. All information requests regarding Closed Medical Records are referred to Medical Records Department.
4.1. 10 Basic Principles of Shared Medical Record are the Principle Components of Person-Centered Care Approach
- It makes care and treatment more understandable.
- It supports participation of the patient and patient’s family in care and treatment process.
- It improves patient safety.
- It strengthens cooperation between the patient and healthcare personnel.
- It encourages shared decision-making.
- It improves patient satisfaction.
- Coordination and continuity of care and treatment improves.
- It ensures a transparent and reliable healing environment.
- It is a patient right.
4.2 Components of Shared Medical Records
- Ensuring patients have real-time access to information at all stages of patient care.
- Assisting patients in understanding medical records.
“This generally occurs by ensuring a healthcare professional, who may explain terminology, clarify misunderstandings and answer possible questions, accompanies the patient.”
- Preserving confidentiality of personal healthcare information by developing processes where patients control who may access to their medical records.
- Providing patients with methods to correct false or missing information along with contribution to observation notes.
5. BEDSIDE SHIFT REPORT / COMMUNICATION CHART USE
Bedside shift change is a principle component of clinical application which is necessary for safely maintaining patient care.
This ensures that patient and patient's relatives are informed regarding the entire treatment, care process and cooperation is established on preventing risks.
Delivering patient-specific information from the medical personnel (nurse, care taker, physician) of one shift to another to ensure continuity and security of patient care is a real-time process.
5.1. SBAR Method in Delivery of Patient Information
Situation: Patient information, complaint, allergy information, primary physician and nurse
Background: Diagnosis, personal history, current medications
Assessment: Vital signs, review of systems, examination and consultation results, current catheter information, risk evaluation results
Recommendation: Recommendations regarding care and treatment, planned examinations The white communication panel that is present in patient rooms is used in our hospital to ensure effective information transfer between shifts regarding continuity of care and improvement of the care quality.
The communication panel is a tool that ensures active participation of the patients to the care plan.
It assists in keeping the patients at the center of the care service.
It is updated in every shift and condition changing event during the period patient is hospitalized, to keep the information updated.
5.2. Patient Preferences and Goals in Care Plan
Preferences and goals of the patient regarding care and treatment processes are identified to improve the quality of provided care service.
We aim to preserve all daily routine habits of our patients, if there is no medical contraindication. Therefore we pay attention to prioritize
sleeping habits, shower routines, hygiene requests, meal times and eating habits along with their cultural preferences.
6. CODE LOTUS MINDFULNESS CENTER
Recent scientific researches proved that many diseases in modern period are triggered by stress, anxiety and environmental factors. While the modern medicine is designed to improve our physical and mental health, holistic approaches such as mindfulness, yoga, acupuncture, meditation and healthy diet are integrated to modern medical approach as complementary and assistive concepts to modern healthcare system.
We started Code Lotus project with the slogan “Heal yourself” in 2018 as a part of our investments on integrative medicine in American Hospital. As similar examples being present in various pioneering hospitals such as Cleveland Clinic and MD Anderson, we provide specially designed programs and workshops with complementary medicine for our employees and patients who are under intensive stress along with all other individuals who feel poorly due to pacing and stress of modern life.
Yoga, pilates and meditation classes organized in Code Lotus aim to ensure that body and breath awareness on the background of mindfulness is gained by the 3
rd party participants, pregnant women and patients (spinal health, chronic pain and cancer). Additionally, homeopathy, biofeedback, chiropractic, functional medicine, osteopathy, alternative diet programs and acupuncture are some of the treatments that are planned to be covered in the program.
Workshops
Curative art activities that are scientifically proved to be effective are beneficial in embodied learning, identification of emotions and providing solutions and ensure development of coping strategies. As being healthy expresses a biological, psychological and social wellness, these applications have a significant contribution in total healing. It aims to heal mental health as much as it aims to heal physical health. Musical Therapy Workshops, Movement/Dance Therapy Workshops and Curative Art Workshops are organized in Code Lotus regarding this field.
Current Course Program Content
Our weekly course program, which is specially designed by physicians and professional trainers, is open for all hospital employees, patients, patient relatives and other individuals who wish to participate. You may participate in mindfulness based yoga, yin yoga, pilates programs, programs for cancer patients, pregnancy courses that may assist you in strengthening your bond with your baby and mindful meditation sessions.
Seminars
In the past, we organized seminars with participation of Dan Segel, M.D. and Gabor Mate, M.D. As Code Lotus Mindfulness we plan to continue inviting expert spokespersons in the future.
7. EMPLOYEE-CENTERED APPROACH
We do know that our most precious asset is human. Therefore, as American Hospital, we make investment constantly to increase our resource of qualified human. We aim to conserve our respectability in the healthcare sector with a system that communicates transparently with patients, provides reliable and quality patient care and treatment and questions and improves itself. Focusing on the employees, which is one of the subjects emphasized by Person-Centered Approach, has a critical importance in this direction. While conducting Person-Centered Care studies, we obtain opinions from employee representatives of all segments and harmonize them with opinions of our patients and their relatives. As the Experience team, who work outside the jurisdiction of Department managers, we evaluate expectations, preferences and requirements of our employees in a similar manner to when we evaluate expectations, preferences and requirements of our patients and conduct surveys on these subjects while implementing any improvement projects. We keep our employees as the focus during Planning-Application-Taking Precautions and Control stages of the projects we plan to implement.