The Imperial Court of Buffalo has once again donated bookbags to children of our patients. This year the Court filled 50 bookbags with school supplies for Evergreen. "Our care coordinators are always appreciative, as well as the patients and children," said Bridget McClain, senior director of care coordination. "We received the delivery at noon and some have already left to deliver the bookbags to the families." Thank you, Imperial Court of Buffalo! Evergreen's Care Coordination staff with some of the 50 bookbags donated by the Imperial Court
This month in Nerd Alert, we’re going to explore two areas in the Information Systems department (IS) - clincial systems and health information, or as we refer to it, medical records. We talked to Julie Mayer, AVP of health information, about how the medical records team has kept up with the ever-growing data available in the health care industry.
Medical records, also referred to as health information, manages patient medical history and
documentation. Over the past few years we have been transitioning to mainly electronic records, instead of keeping paper records. We’ll talk more about medical records in future articles.
The history of the medical records area is pretty interesting! It was not formalized when Julie first
started in this role. Each department kept track of their own information. When Julie came on in 2015, it was really to help us get Medent up and running. As our use of Medent grew, state databases were expanded and companies like HEALTHeLINK were growing, and our access to clinical data through electronic means continually changed. Julie and others working in our patient documentation systems realized they needed a more formalized medical records department.
Christina Mihilitas, director of clinical systems, came on originally to help with system security. She also became an expert in Medent and was able to streamline our processes even more, and ended up officially leading the clinical systems portion of Julie’s team. Today clinical systems manages and teaches us about many of the systems we work with, and we will focus on them more next month.
Julie works with anything that directly connects to (or “interfaces with”) Medent. HEALTHeLINK is
a big one, and some of the hospitals, such as Kaleida, have a direct interface. She communicates directly with vendors like these to troubleshoot problems and maintain our relationship with them. Julie also figures out unconventional problems. She stays in touch with people at medical offices, and maintains a contact list for every hospital for when we need to gather data that is not being sent to us directly. We are always trying to improve communication and automated information transfer between ourselves and these other organizations, which she often facilitates as part of their relationship. Julie even works with other organizations to help them develop better processes. Quest recently had a huge data conversion project, so Julie played a role in helping them monitor and resolve data problems throughout the project. She has played an important role in ensuring the project is successful. Julie points out that she works really closely with clinical systems, and as many teams as she can. It’s also important for us to understand and work with all the other teams at Evergreen so we know how they are using the systems. “It’s all related if you think about it. Anything that is going to be put in the system, medical records needs to know about. Is it part of the record? What's the code? Is it filed correctly in the chart?” said Julie. Communication is a very key part of her job. "We don't work in silos. We try to make sure everyone knows what's going on."
The reason to keep track of all this data, and try to get a big picture understanding of how it works at
every level of Evergreen, is something everyone in Julie’s department is focused on. “We strive to make everything as easy as possible for our end users while making sure out patients are our main focus.”
Heather Wilson from the IS team shared these photographs of the Welcome Wagon's egg drop activity. The Welcome Wagon is an employee resource group where the newest members of Team Evergreen gather to network, socialize and participate in teambuilding activities. At the September meeting Welcome Wagon members divided into teams of two to work on strategies to be able to drop a raw egg without breaking it. Heather reports there were lots of eggcellent jokes and varying degrees of success in completing the mission. "We all had a great time," she said. "And met people from other departments we wouldn't have otherwise." Thank you Heather for the report and the great pics!
Clockwise from left: Kandice Hood represents Community Access Services at Buffalo Bill Ty Nsekhe's Back to School Giveaway event. Students received backpacks filled with school supplies, free haircuts and time with team members. Parents got information from Kandice and representatives from a variety of community resources. Thank you Arica Rouse for these photos! Lori Anthony and Matthew Crehan Higgins presented at the recent Conference on LGBTQ Health in New Orleans. Their topic was implementing rapid access to HIV treatment. Team Evergreen lives the suite life (see what we did there?) at a recent Buffalo Bills game. Ivette Chavez Gonzalez takes the Take the Stairs challenge.
The past two issues of Connections have shared Evergreen's new marketing campaign, which features billboards and transit ads placed all over Western New York. We've also shared your entries in the selfie contest. Turn the page to see more contest entries, and don't stop there... the selfie contest winner will be announced later in this issue!
Who won the contest? Find out later in this issue!
Create an Account with Univera a. b. c. d. e. f. g. h.
Go to https://www.univerahealthcare.com/wps/portal/uv/member-login/. Click on Register & Create Account. Enter required information from your ID Card, click continue. Create a username, enter your personal email address, create password and answers to security questions. Click the box if you'd like paperless statements. If the box isn't checked you'll receive paper statements. Click continue. Review your information and click submit. An email will be sent to the address provided. Follow the instructions in the email to complete account registration to verify your email. You will be redirected to the website.
Registering for Univera Wellness Card a. b. c. d.
Log in with the information you created Click on Health and Wellness, Univera Wellness Your Way – Get Started Confirm the address you would like the card to be sent to, check the attestation box, and click submit. You will receive a notice stating submission accepted, and the amount that will be on your card ($150 Single and employee + child(ren), $300 Employee + Spouse and Family). The card will be sent to the address provided within 10-15 business days.
Clockwise from left: Peach and Sadie, photo by Matthew Sydor. Kim Smith was selected as an HHUNY Hero at the recent quarterly meeting. The Hero award recognizes outstanding commitment and dedication in working with a member to achieve positive outcomes. Great job, Kim, and thanks to Rebekah Bongiorno for the tip! The Mathews Building crew dedicated "Brunetti Boulevard" in honor of Cheryl Brunetti. Best wishes on your retirement, Cheryl! Dan Verzelloni and husband Joel, Suzanne Weessies and friend Fabio attended the Sh*tty Hawkins Summer Vacation Dance Party, a fundraiser for the Pride Center. Evergreen held a special Thank You Happy Hour for outgoing Evergreen Health, CAS and Pride Center Board members to thank them for their support.
Fall is here and so is the FunC Fall Festival! Join us on October 30, 2019 for donuts, apples, pies, ciders and lots of fun fall activities. The Fall Festival will be held at the Elmwood, Bailey and Jamestown locations.
Mark your calendar! The submission deadline for the November issue of Connections is Wednesday, October 18. Be sure to get your content in before the deadline to guarantee placement. And, don't forget, we love to share your photos. Kids, pets, vacations, recipes, send them all to Connections at Evergreen Connections via Outlook.
Birthdays Norma Bocanegra.......................... October 1 Matthew John Pasquarella......... October 1 DeJuan Burnell................................. October 1 Lauren Voelkle................................. October 3 Jenna Gallitto.................................... October 4 Cortney Anderson.......................... October 4 Lizzie Feliz........................................... October 5 Yolanda Sims..................................... October 5 Heather Maloney............................. October 6 Katheen Crissey.............................. October 8 Amanda LaFleur............................. October 8 Christina Mihalitsas...................... October 9 Kandice Hood................................... October 9 Jennifer Halper................................ October 10 Gregory Fulgham............................ October 11 Courtney Rhines............................. October 11 Bianca Morris.................................... October 12 Stephani Miranda........................... October 14 Christina Cornell............................ October 14 Sean Foster......................................... October 19 Gaia Oliver.......................................... October 20 Dawn Trotter..................................... October 20 Latisha Maxwell............................... October 21 Nicole Coonly.................................... October 21 Cornelia Meredith.......................... October 21 Kayleen O'Halloran........................ October 22 Krista Orrange................................. October 22 Theresa Oden................................... October 23 Lilkizzy Tell........................................ October 24 Arica Rouse........................................ October 25 Susan Buck......................................... October 26 Matthew Edson................................. October 28 Jillian Dagastino.............................. October 28 Amanda Beals................................... October 31 Carlton Rausch................................. October 31
Anniversaries
Lean-In The Lean In employee resource group is for employees who identify as women. It is an educational group for sharing ideas and experiences and setting professional goals. This group is for encouraging and empowering women to succeed in the workplace. The next meeting is on October 18, 2019 at 3:00 p.m. in the 5th floor Boardroom. Please contact Jocelyn Leising with any questions.
Welcome Wagon The next Welcome Wagon meeting will be held in December. Watch for details or contact Michael Canty with questions.
Annual Trainings The next round of annual trainings are now available on Evergreen University. These trainings will take about 2.5 hours to complete and will be due on December 31, 2019. Please contact Jocelyn Leising with any questions. Happy Learning!
Sheila Marcheson.................................. 11 years Laurie Abbatessa................................... 6 years Brittani McKay......................................... 5 years Emily Oaks................................................. 5 years Mindi Levine............................................. 5 years Veronica Velazquez............................. 4 years Ian Eastman.............................................. 4 years David Haefner.......................................... 4 years Maria Cruz................................................. 4 years Theo Herman........................................... 4 years Mayerling Garofalo............................... 3 years Kylee Berberich...................................... 3 years Julie Rapp................................................... 3 years Adan Costanza........................................ 3 years joseph Pignatora..................................... 3 years Alex Marranca........................................ 3 years Sashira Quintana................................... 3 years Erin Pepicello........................................... 3 years Ann Breidenstein................................... 3 years Michael Ludwick.................................... 3 years Robert Moore........................................... 3 years Mark Wolf................................................... 3 years Ruby Orcutt............................................... 2 years Jillian Dagastino..................................... 2 years Christina Carter...................................... 2 years Erin Fleckenstein................................... 2 years Nicole Mitchell......................................... 2 years Anthony Roth........................................... 2 years Amanda LaFleur.................................... 2 years Alyssa Sherman...................................... 2 years Ashleigh Brown...................................... 1 year Emma Hathaway.................................... 1 year Brianna McKay........................................ 1 year Robert Cunningham............................ 1 year Christine Kemp....................................... 1 year Andrea Karash........................................ 1 year
A Alex McGann
A Jennifer Colon
A Alicia Coulter
A Jillian Dagastino
A Andrea Karash
A John Carocci
A Andrew Kiener &
A Julie Vaughan
A Kandice Hood
the Quality Team
A Ann Breidenstein
A Kate Gallivan
A Carrie Rich
A Kaitlyn Gately
A Christina Turner
A Katherine Mego
A Dale Kingston
A Kevin Bidtah
A Daniele Verzelloni
A Linda Colburn
A Felissha Humphries
A Maria Cruz
A Jasmine Padilla
A Matthew Edson
A Jason Rein
A Melissa Murray
A Jeff Heras
A Melissa Nagro
A Nancy Colon A Rebecca Clark A Rob Baird A Rob Cunningham &
the Security Team
A Shakiya Bell A Sonya Tanner A Steve Jagord A Suzanne Weessies A Teresa Lane A The IT Department A Tiffany Valentin
1.
Dial extension 2222
2. Follow the prompt to record the Code Blue or Mr. Webber and say the exact location and building of the incident 3. Hang up your phone. This will prompt your message to be broadcast to all Evergreen locations
Publisher/Layout John Carocci
Copy Editor Amy Usiak
Contributors
4. The Code Blue team and Security will respond to the incident
Jocelyn Leising Heather Wilson Kristy Mangel
You'll have 30 seconds to record your message. If you're not done in 30 seconds you'll be cut off and your message will be automatically broadcast. It's imperative that you say the location and building in your message: “Code Blue in the men’s lobby bathroom in the Elmwood building” or“Could Mr. Webber please come to the Mathews building counselor room?”. The Code Blue/ Mr. Webber Softkey has been removed from all phones.
Connections is the monthly newsletter for employees and Board members of Evergreen Health and its affilliates, the Pride Center of Western New York and Community Access Services. Please send us your story ideas, photos, feedback, or just a friendly hello at Evergreen Connections via Outlook.