Go Live

The past two weeks have been a test to see if my training over the month of May was enough to prepare me for the challenges I would face while working on the hospital floors. The initial period of Go Live was filled with both unpleasant and joyous moment. Many factors, such as unfamiliarity with workflow or medical terminology, made my job difficult. There were many instances where I found that I could not answer a provider's question simply because I did not understand what they wanted or were looking for, or I just did not know of a way to troubleshoot their problems. So what was my work around? I simply took advantage of the resources around me such as exploring the practice environment in the hope of discovering a solution myself, asking my fellow "At the Elbow" team members if they knew how to solve the problem, or by questioning veteran vendors and support staff who were very familiar with the system and had been through Go Lives before. Another issue that made me want to pull my hair out at times was the attitude of some the practitioners I was trying to help. Often, practitioners became frustrated with the system since it was difficult for many of them to understand and, also, because it prevented them from working as quickly and efficiently as they had before. This lead too many of them taking out their frustration on us when we tried to help or to constant complaining about the software to their fellow workers, which created a common negative image of the system in the unit. To get past this obstacle I took it upon myself to be as patient as possible, as well as to try and listen to the provider’s complaints in an attempt to really discover why they were upset and create a solution to their problem. One way I remedied this issue was by reminding the practitioners that the sooner they learned the new system the faster they could care for their patients, as well as that the new program would actually make their jobs easier in the long run and that I guaranteed they would be quite happy with it by the end of the summer. These two weeks also provided me with numerous benefits that I will use later in life such as a general understanding of the flow of care in healthcare, as well as a better comprehension of the specific roles each person in a healthcare team plays. More importantly, though, the past couple weeks have let me experience the major road blocks each type of provider experiences on a day to day basis and allow me to see how health care teams communicate to tackle issues. At this point I have a better understanding of the issues I will face in the future, but I am ready and willing to take these challenges head on!