MEDICAL-SURGICAL/ TELEMETRY UNIT-BASED COUNCIL

In 2022, the group worked on enhancing quality patient care and continuous improvement, including a focus on patient communication, mobility and skin health and physicians and nurses joining together for patient rounds.

The Med-Surg Unit-Based Council (UBC) is one of the many nursing accomplishments the Medical-Surgical/ Telemetry Service line pushed forward in 2022.

It started with a small group that wanted to elevate the clinical practice in the service line. The team worked hard to bring staff into monthly meetings. One of its proudest accomplishments was creating the Unit Champions, which promoted staff involvement and shared governance.

Erwin Gallardo Preceptor shares his wisdom and knowledge

“In September 2019. I started my journey to become a nurse practitioner. Little did everyone know that there would be a global pandemic that would change everybody’s lives the next year. However, I still pushed through, studied hard and in August 2022, I completed my studies and graduated with a master’s nursing degree concentrating on the Family Nurse Practitioner program.”

— Michael Sinfuego

In addition, the council assisted in auditing charts, staff education to reduce patient falls, HAPIs, central line associated bloodstream infection (CLABSI), catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs) and early mobility. As a result, the group has seen an increase in staff engagement and empowerment. The group also created a Standardized Visibility Board on each unit highlighting UBC’s activities.

Of all the relationships a new nurse has in the first year, the most important is the relationship with the person who is onboarding. At Henry Mayo, that person is a preceptor, an experienced nurse who supervises nursing students during their rotations and helps them gain clinical competence.

In 2022, Henry Mayo gave its Preceptor of the Year Award to Erwin Gallardo, a senior clinical RN on Tower-5, who joined the hospital in 2006 and started precepting that same year.

“Erwin has all the qualifications of a great preceptor: excellent in his own practice, a calm demeanor and realistic expectations of what new nurses should be doing,” explains Henry Mayo’s Director of Staff Development Joe Greene, DNP, RN. “Those who have benefitted from his onboarding style have noted how organized he was, with a very well thought out plan before every shift.”