Welcome to November,

The end of 2019 is quickly approaching but the halls of HDGH are still bustling with great new projects, events, initiatives, and efforts to change lives! You'll read about these things and more in today's edition of E-Connect.

Enjoy!

Maciah

For the patients with Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare’s Geriatric Assessment Program’s (GAP) Age-Wise Program, their regular group exercise class, held this past Friday, was nothing short of a Monster Mash.

The Age-Wise Program is a 12-week course consisting of group exercise and support from the GAP’s Occupational Therapist, Louise Arpin, Kinesiologist, Katie Martin, Social Worker, Jenniffer Clifford, and Dietitian, Mairi Lenover. The exercise portion of the program aims to decrease deconditioning and frailty by improving or maintaining strength, range-of-motion, balance, coordination, endurance and basic functional skills. The support and education portion of this program is aimed at improving and maintaining the patient and caregiver’s mental and emotional well-being by providing a social atmosphere where they can feel supported.

On a few special occasions throughout the year, patients of the program work on a special performance that utilizes evidence based movements to an orchestrated dance that not only gives a workout, but also improves their confidence. This past Friday was one of those special occasions.

“I want you to all envision three circles; one labelled challenge, one complexity, and one purpose,” Louise, explained to the group before the performance. “When you find an activity, like your Age-Wise classes, where all three of these pieces work together, that's how you keep your brain strong as well as your muscles.”

Fitting with the Halloween theme, the impressive group of men and women showcased what they have learned and how strong they’re becoming at a special performance to “Sugar, Sugar” by The Archies last week.

Equipped with two glow sticks and Halloween garb, patients stomped, bounced, shimmied, and swayed to their choreographed exercise dance routine, showing that there is nothing scary about getting older.

Canadian Patient Safety Week is held each year during the last week of October as a way to increase awareness of patient safety issues and aims to share information about best practices in patient safety with healthcare providers, patients, residents, clients, and their families. 

 

This year the Canadian Patient Safety Institute focused on  battling systemic silence. This silence exists between patients and providers, between colleagues in healthcare facilities, between administrators in different regions, and between the public and policymakers. The Institute wants to teach people in Canada that if something looks wrong, feels wrong, or is wrong – we need to speak up. By conquering silence, we work together for better healthcare for all.  

 

Throughout the week, Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare’s inter-professional teams promoted safety and the work they do year-round to ensure the safety of our patients and clients. Resources were provided to further educate staff and visitors on important topics. Finally, on Halloween, a “Room of Horrors” was staged to allow staff to recognize health and safety hazards in the care setting.

Planet or plastic?

That’s the question staff on HDGH’s Complex Medical Care, 2 South Unit are asking those who walk through their doors.

The idea for the environmentally friendly initiative currently taking place on the unit was sparked after a visitor noticed many of the staff drinking and using plastic water bottles. The visitor challenged the staff to make a change.

And so through the team’s Unit Based Council (UBC), the group is challenging each other, patients, visitors, and all throughout our organization to do their part in keeping our Earth free from plastic water bottles by going green with reusable ones.

The UBC has since decorated their unit bulletin board to inspire others to make the pledge to ditch the plastic. Wrapped in recycled newspaper and dotted with sticky notes for passersby to sign their name and commit to plastic-free beverage containers, the board gives statistics and thoughts on ways to be more environmentally friendly in smalls ways that have big impacts!

As part of our Mission to cultivate a healthier community, Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare has become increasingly involved in creating projects working in ways that will enhance our organization’s environmental sustainability; a healthier community, means healthier people.

 

To discuss some of these initiatives and represent our organization, Environmental Services Supervisor and Project Manager of Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare’s Green Initiatives Program, Jason Schneider, was invited by Merchant’s Paper Company to attend the Merchant’s 2019 Sustainability Conference and Trade Show hosted at the Ciociaro Club this past Friday, November 1 ^st . During the trade show, Jason had the opportunity to meet vendors from all over North America who are committed to providing their customers with eco-friendly and sustainable products. 

 

“It was amazing to see such cutting edge technologies and products coming into the market, as well as the degree of commitment these vendors have in terms of promoting environmentally responsible practices in various industries,” Jason explains. Attending the event offered the unique opportunity to discuss Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare’s sustainability goals and how vendors can help us reach certain targets. 

 

“Some of the key things we look for when choosing a vendor, in addition to their product line, is whether or not they make concerted efforts to reduce shipping distances when sourcing their product line, and the materials used in packaging, among other things. Ideally, we want to do business with those vendors that have environmental sustainability engrained in their business culture.”

 

At the conference, Jason was also asked to give a short presentation to vendors and 7 ^th graders from a local school on environmental sustainability in the healthcare setting. “Unfortunately, the healthcare industry is a major polluter due to the fact that so many items come into contact with patients that have or may have communicable diseases. This makes it impossible to reuse or recycle certain items and also prevents us from selling used materials to scrap reprocessing companies for revenue. Therefore, the focus should be placed on purchasing materials that do not have a large environmental footprint, particularly materials that will biodegrade in our landfills if they cannot be reused or recycled.”

 

We would like to thank Jason for the hard work and dedication he has shown to making, not only Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare, but our entire community a greener place to be.

On Tuesday morning, Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare alongside media partner Bell Media launched its annual Pledge Campaign, but this year with a new goal - making the act of kindness viral.

In its seventh year as Gold Sponsor, Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare has been involved in the original direction as the Pledge to End Bullying. They spent the first five years ensuring the community and their more than 1,100 staff understood the definition of bullying as well as their role and responsibly in ending it. 

In 2018, the hospital took the opportunity to speak about our local homelessness issues. The objective? To remind Windsor-Essex that we are all human and have the right to live in a community where we feel safe, included, valued and accepted.

This year's pledge, now called the iPledge Challenge, is asking participants to take to social media to spread one very important message - the power of kindness.

"It doesn't need to be complicated, or extravagant," said Bill Marra, Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare VP of External Affairs. "Show yourself doing something kind - hold the door open, treat someone to a coffee, smile - use the hashtag #iPledgeChallenge and challenge a friend. Let's see how far this can go!"

Speaking at the launch event were veteran CTV News Anchor Jim Crichton, Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare Physiotherapist Sue Grebe, President and CEO Janice Kaffer, and 11-year old Liam Dutot (pictured top-left), son of a Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare staff member.

Instead of birthday presents, Liam reminded local youth that "kindness is cool" and asked for donations to three local charities.

Liam, along with Janice and three other staff members, were all featured in the morning's iPledge Challenge commercial premiere that will air from now until February on CTV.

"The Pledge has grown and evolved over the years, but has always remained intact with our HDGH values of Respect, Teamwork, Compassion and Social Responsibility," said Kaffer. "As an organization, we truly believe that our values are more than words on a wall, but instead integrated into what we do - serve the healthcare needs of patients and clients, ensure our staff, physicians and volunteers feel safe, and cultivate a healthier Windsor-Essex."

Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare's annual Tree of Lights Campaign is a longstanding community tradition that encourages community members to make a monetary donation in memory or in honour of someone special to our Changing Lives Together Foundation. Funds raised during the campaign benefit programs and services at Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare, making a significant difference in how care is delivered.

Join us as we kick off our 2019 Campaign with our tree lighting ceremony held in the Ken Lewenza Sr. Lobby, November 13th at 10:00 a.m.

For more information on the Tree of Lights Campaign, or to make a donation please call our Foundation Office at 519.257.5111 ext. 76910 or visit us online at www.HDGH.org/treeoflights.

We invite you to a new engagement and info-sharing event for social services in the Windsor-Essex region on Wednesday, November 13th from 5:00 - 9:00 p.m.

The first-ever It Starts With Us: Social Forum is an exhibition featuring over 18 of the area’s most valued service organizations joining forces to spread the word in terms of accessible and low cost or free programs and services to Windsor-Essex residents.