To: NAOHP members
Re: Winter Quarter 2012 conference call
From: Stacey Hart, member services coordinator
The NAOHP Board held its winter quarter meeting via conference call on February 20, 2012. Executive Director Frank Leone and staff member Stacey Hart were in attendance.
Opening comments Mr. Leone welcomed new member Trena Williams to the board. Board President Dr. Steven Crawford thanked all of the board members for their participation on the call.
2012 national conference Mr. Leone reported that an online survey will be emailed to all NAOHP members to get feedback and suggestions regarding curriculum topics at RYAN Associates’ 26th annual national conference, October 8-10, 2012, in Chicago. He said that curriculum development and the agenda are underway and will be finalized soon.
New member recruitment and renewals Board member Mike Schmidt and Ms. Hart reported NAOHP membership renewals have been sent via hard copy and email over the last few months. Renewals are coming in at a steady rate. Members who have not yet renewed will be contacted by NAOHP staff and board members.
NAOHP vendor program Mr. Schmidt suggested it would be helpful to reach out to vendors in the areas of on-site clinics and prevention/wellness programs, as they are very closely related to occupational health and could benefit from both NAOHP membership and exhibiting at the national conference in Chicago, where there will be a wide variety of occupational health-related service lines as topics for sessions.
Staff and clinician relationships Mr. Leone reported that RYAN Associates continues to explore options for jointly hosting an educational program with ACOEM later in 2012. He will also be a featured speaker at the annual UCAOA and AAOHN meetings in April and the ACOEM National Conference in May. The NAOHP will participate in a vendor exhibit at all three conferences.
Member education and services Ms. Hart noted that registration has opened for the 2012 Web-based seminar series on Achieving Exceptional Patient Service and Customer Satisfaction. Contact hours for continuing education in nursing have been applied for through the American Association of Occupational Health Nurses (AAOHN) for the series. Mr. Leone will be conducting a summer seminar tour in nine cities (San Francisco, Cincinnati, Nashville, Philadelphia, Northern New Jersey, Boston, Cleveland, Detroit, and Chicago) across the country. The seminar series will coincide with the publication of his new book Marketing Healthcare Services to Employers: Strategies and Tactics (due out in May).
Member benchmarking Mr. Leone reported that a joint venture with Press Ganey to provide national patient satisfaction benchmarking data for occupational health clinics is in the final stages (see cover story).
Publications RYAN Associates has four popular publications: Occupational Health Sales and Marketing for a New Era, Clinical Care Update: the Complete Collection, and The Complete Resource Guide to Occupational Health Program Management. Mr. Leone noted that his new hardcover book, due out in May, is published by the Sea Hill Press and will cover a broad array of tips and strategies for many types of healthcare service lines.
Schedule The next NAOHP board meeting will be held by conference call on May 24.
Every issue, we ask our members to share secrets of their success by answering one question. The question for our next issue is “What one cost cutting strategy has your program employed in order to address profitability while still maintaining clinical excellence?” To participate, please email rvesely@naohp.com.
Our question this issue is: “How does your program justify the value of your interventions to your employer clients?”
“We meet face to face on a regular basis with our top clients to ensure we continue to meet their needs. We also provide company-specific reports annually with an injury care management report card. We also share our overall injury care management report with other clients.” — Denise Eastham, director, Urgent Care/Occupational Health, Valley Health, Front Royal, Va.
“By utilizing our software system to generate outcome studies. Reports that provide comprehensive data on each and every patient we treat are provided to our client companies on a regular basis. These reports detail such metrics as: patient days in treatment, light duty days, out-of-work days, and total cost of the treatment, both medical and physical therapy. For large employers, we can break out this data by department. In many cases, we hand-deliver these outcome study reports and elaborate on what they mean. We tie these data out to how our quality care positively impacts the employer’s costs. We discuss why our physician team is focused on returning injured employees back to work aggressively so as to reduce the employer’s days away from work.” — Hunter K. Giroux, chief executive officer, Connecticut Occupational Medicine Partners, Hartford, Conn.
“By providing positive results! We start by building a partnership with our employer and insurance clients based on mutual trust. We strive to provide quality patient-centered care, conditional offer exams, and comprehensive wellness services. When we maintain our focus on quality patient-centered care, our clients realize the positive clinical and financial benefits.” — Nora Shippelhoute, manager, Enloe Occupational Health Center, Chico, Calif.
“Through multimedia communications, prompt responsiveness, and metrics of performance, our clients experience quality in our service delivery.” — Mary Alice Ehrlich, executive vice president. MED-1 Occupational Health System, Grand Rapids, Mich.
“We are a ‘one-stop shop’ for their injury and non-injury needs, as well as TPA and random drug screen program Management. We also provide guidance for any occupational questions they may have — ranging from questions about causation to hearing conservation, wellness, and a variety of miscellaneous concerns. Many times we do this free of charge as a courtesy to our loyal customer base.” — Kimberly Eidson, director of occupational Medicine, Freeman Health System, Joplin, Mo.
“Our program values the importance of getting the injured worker back to work and is reflective in our medical providers’ care of the patient and responsiveness to the employer’s needs.” — Tim Ross, regional director of Occupational/Employee Health, Franciscan Alliance, Mishawaka, Ind.
“We actually use benchmarks from the NAOHP to show how well we manage cases! We also use testimonials.” — Steve Buxton, vice president of operations, NovaCare, Huntington Valley, Pa
