INNOVATION & TEAMWORK
By Kim Robuck, Hospital Development Manager
Frosting-covered fingers, overloaded carts bearing donation booth items, blue and green day outfits, and sore feet! Hospitals may notice a whirlwind of activity from our Donation Consultants this month as we facilitate donation displays, cake and flag ceremonies, tree plantings, and other events in recognition of National Donate Life Month in our hospitals. While this provides a great opportunity to share stories about the importance of donation, it is only a small part of the work of Donor Alliance’s hospital development team.
A typical day for a Donation Consultant starts with a morning conference call to discuss case activity. This communication is critical to ensure that the team works together to coordinate follow-up calls, onsite evaluations, and to provide the appropriate level of support for hospitals.
Nurses, chaplains, physicians, social workers, respiratory therapists, and other key hospital staff fulfill a crucial role in the donation process. Donation would not be possible without this teamwork and we are so appreciative of the support! To strengthen these relationships, you will often find our Donation Consultants rounding in hospitals to provide education, case outcome information, and assess needs.
When we are not following up on cases, you may find us assisting with medical record reviews, providing donation related data to donor teams and quality departments, training hospital designated tissue requestors, or sharing best practices with other organ procurement organizations and re
covery agencies.
One of the messages we have heard from managers, educators, and key hospital staff is that dedicated time for donation education can be a challenge. As a result, our team has worked hard to find innovative ways to share information. This has resulted in quick online quizzes to assess donation knowledge, collaborative coffee cart education rounds, skills day competencies, and newsletter articles. We are now also able to provide CEPTCs at formal educational events, including our Donation Summit and, most recently, our Ambassador Training Workshops. These new workshops provide an in-depth clinical focus on the organ donation process and highlight the importance of working together to maximize the number of lives saved through organ and tissue donation.
Our May Ambassador Training is full, but if you are a medical professional interested in continuing education on organ and tissue donation check DonorAlliance.org/programs/hospital-development-programs for more information on our October Northern Colorado Workshop and others coming soon.
