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St. Elizabeth Health Center achieves Magnet designation Nursing excellence
Patient Fred Mays of Youngstown is assisted by RN Joe Kukla.
YOUNGSTOWN
Achieving Magnet status means nurse involvement in decisions that improve the quality of patient care, said Joe Kukla, a registered nurse at St. Elizabeth Health Center.
It fosters nursing excellence that leads to better patient outcomes, said Barbra Turner, RN, coordinator of the Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner program at St. Elizabeth in Youngstown.
“I’m very proud and excited to have achieved the Magnet designation. We live and breathe the level of nursing excellence every single day,” said Turner, also editor of Notes on Nursing, the nursing newsletter at St. Elizabeth.
What Kukla and Turner are referring to is the American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Magnet Recognition Program for excellence in nursing that in 2010 designated St. Elizabeth Health Center in Youngstown and St. Joseph Health Center in Warren as Magnet hospitals for the third time.
In 2002, St. Elizabeth and St. Joseph were the first hospitals in Ohio to receive Magnet status and among the first 60 hospitals in the nation so designated.
In addition in 2010, St. Elizabeth Boardman Health Center achieved Magnet recognition for the first time. Also included in the 2010 Magnet designation are St. Elizabeth Emergency and Diagnostic Center in Austintown, St. Joseph Emergency and Diagnostic Center in Andover, and the St. Joseph Outpatient Surgery Center in Howland.
“Magnet recognition is to nursing what a Lombardi Trophy is to [pro] football, what a gold medal is to the Olympics,” said Robert Shroder, president and chief executive officer of Humility of Mary Health Partners, umbrella company for the medical facilities recognized.
“To earn Magnet status once is a tremendous accomplishment and a great source of pride for our nurses. To retain Magnet status for another four years really underscores the commitment of our entire staff to continually strive harder each day to meet the health-care needs of the people we serve,” Shroder said.
The Magnet program is an educational process, said Kukla, who had the “privilege” of being on a committee associated with the initial Magnet designation for St. Elizabeth Youngstown and St. Joseph.
Kukla continues to be involved in the Magnet effort as co-chairman of the Nurse Advisory Council that meets with Catherine Tolbert, senior vice president of nursing and clinical services/chief nurse executive for HMHP, on a monthly basis.
The meetings provide an opportunity for nurses to have input on issues and policies that affect nurses.
“We have a real voice in the administrative process,” said Kukla, who has worked at St. Elizabeth 33 years, including 10 as a manager. He went back to bedside direct-patient care about eight years ago.
“We provide opportunities for nurses to grow and take other positions in the hospital,” said Nancy Siefert, nursing director and Magnet Program director at St. Elizabeth in Youngstown and Boardman and St. Joseph in Warren.
“On the other hand, ANCC noted that our culture also fosters nurses who want to stay at the bedside, such as Joe. It is great for the hospital because it keeps experienced nurses in direct patient care if that is what they want,” Siefert added.
“The Magnet Program is a huge endeavor that involves everyone ... how they work and how they take care of patients,” Tolbert said.
It looks at how the organization supports its nurses, which are its main underpinning, and a participatory management style. Nurses are a professional body of people who have a say in what happens here, she said.
An example of support for nurses is a newly implemented safe patient handling system at HMHP hospitals called Living Injury Free Together. HMHP spent more than $1 million for equipment and training for the program, Tolbert said.
Achieving Magnet status also supports quality and excellence, two of the core values of HMHP’s mission, she said.
“St. Elizabeth Youngstown and St. Joseph Warren are better institutions today because of our Magnet re-designation four years ago. It raised the bar on patient care and inspired all of us – nurses, physicians, professional and support staff – to strive to be even better. That’s what enabled us to become a Magnet facility in the first place and why seeking similar recognition for St. Elizabeth Boardman was so important,” Tolbert said.
“I believe in mission of HMHP. I think of nursing as a ministry ... taking care of people in their most vulnerable moments,” Kukla said.