I was honored last Wednesday when my project was chosen for the National Patient Safety week challenge. In all honesty, all of the projects were wonderful, and I'm not even sure how mine ended up on top.
My project, presentation, etc., are all from 7 years of hard work in pulling together and trying to implement an "actual" Oral Hygiene Protocol and Free Water Protocol. **Note, we do not currently charge patients for water...it's free--as in unrestricted**. The gist is that if patients are on thickened liquids and we do strict oral hygiene (at least three times each day) they can have thin water between their meals. We as a staff are responsible for offering water to those patients more frequently. The benefit is less post admission infections, better patient outcomes, and shorter acute care stays!
So, anyhow, again, I am humbled and honored to have been chosen for this award. I am over the moon that some of the physicians have already begun to write orders. I think we are on the way to even better patient care here at MCH!
Monday, March 12, 2012
IL Products Expo
John and I had a chance to volunteer to hand out samples of "Da Burger" at the IL Products Expo on March 3rd. It was a lot of fun, and I was really surprised by the amount of vendors at this event. There were many small farmers present and some specialty growers, along with vendors with beer. They also dedicated a whole section to IL Wine and it was great to see our August Hill friends there.
We got to taste some fantastic cheeses (thanks Ropp's for bringing the Green Olive cheese!), brats, beer, honey, fudge, etc. Entry was only $5 (for us it was free since we were volunteering), and we got a free t-shirt to boot. At the IL Pork booth, Bloomington Meats were selling 1/3 lb pork burgers (3/pack) and pork spice. They emptied the chest freezer at least twice while we were there. It was estimated that we gave out over 3200 samples on Saturday alone, and they carried this over to Sunday!
Feel free to ask at your grocer's counter for ground pork burgers (they are different than sausage because they have no seasoning). Have them make 1/3 or 1/2 pound burgers to be extra delicious!!!
We got to taste some fantastic cheeses (thanks Ropp's for bringing the Green Olive cheese!), brats, beer, honey, fudge, etc. Entry was only $5 (for us it was free since we were volunteering), and we got a free t-shirt to boot. At the IL Pork booth, Bloomington Meats were selling 1/3 lb pork burgers (3/pack) and pork spice. They emptied the chest freezer at least twice while we were there. It was estimated that we gave out over 3200 samples on Saturday alone, and they carried this over to Sunday!
Feel free to ask at your grocer's counter for ground pork burgers (they are different than sausage because they have no seasoning). Have them make 1/3 or 1/2 pound burgers to be extra delicious!!!
Last week was Ag Week
In Michele Payne Knoper's recent blog, she asks...does ag week actually make a difference? Are we doing it right, can we "switch our shoes?" so to speak and have a conversation about what is important to the consumer, or are we preaching to them about how we are right? Here's the link to her conversation:
http://www.causematters.com/advocacy/agriculture-week/
On my end, I spent a WONDERFUL day at Holy Cross School. I was welcomed into each of the classrooms. I was shocked by the questions that even the little kiddos posed, and was so pleased to get a chance to talk to them. It is surprising that even in a small town, there are very few "farm kids" in our school. Many of them were surprised by the amount of animals we have with only our family taking care of them. Naturally, they all giggled when we talked about poop, but we discussed how we call it manure and what we do with all of it.
Overall it was a fun day. Check out these resources for some really fun games.
www.myamericanfarm.org
www.podtoplate.org
http://www.causematters.com/advocacy/agriculture-week/
On my end, I spent a WONDERFUL day at Holy Cross School. I was welcomed into each of the classrooms. I was shocked by the questions that even the little kiddos posed, and was so pleased to get a chance to talk to them. It is surprising that even in a small town, there are very few "farm kids" in our school. Many of them were surprised by the amount of animals we have with only our family taking care of them. Naturally, they all giggled when we talked about poop, but we discussed how we call it manure and what we do with all of it.
Overall it was a fun day. Check out these resources for some really fun games.
www.myamericanfarm.org
www.podtoplate.org
New Acronym, and I love it!!!!
HSUS: The “Hysterical Society for Uninformed Simpletons”
What a riot. Thanks again to Humane Watch for that one.
Visualization of HSUS donations to IL shelters.
I wanted to share this image I got off of www.humanewatch.org I find it very interesting that IL's percentage of donations is just over one 1/100th of a %. Look at some of the other states....0% in some of them. So, when you make a donation because you saw a TV commercial, where do you think your $$ are going? Think about it.
Golly...this is harder than I thought
So the end of February/beginning of March has been rough on our family. We have had sick kids, I herniated a disc in my back, and life continues at the crazy pace. I am 11 posts behind and doing my best to catch up. I apologize for the truncated posts that you are probably going to be getting until I get caught up. I think I bit off more than I can chew, but I won't give up.
Hang in there with me!
Kate
Hang in there with me!
Kate
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