For the second consecutive year, WellSpan Health has won a prestigious Hospital and Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania (HAP) Achievement award, this time for the regional health system’s innovative effort to prevent workplace violence and improve safety at its hospitals by de-escalating behavioral health emergencies.
WellSpan’s Behavioral Emergency Response Team (BERT) has earned the 2020 Optimal Operations Award, one of 12 HAP Achievement Award winners across Pennsylvania. In 2019, WellSpan Health won the prestigious Living the Vision Award for its innovative approach at addressing housing insecurity for its most vulnerable patients.
This year, WellSpan’s BERT initiative was selected from 131 entries for HAP’s 2020 Achievement Awards. The program involves the development and training of a dedicated rapid response team to de-escalate behavioral health situations with the goal of preventing violence and injury to patients, visitors and staff.
“This nursing-led initiative set out to find a better way to deescalate high-risk situations utilizing creative methods from a multidisciplinary team of support personnel,” said Michael Seim, M.D., senior vice president and chief quality officer, WellSpan Health. “This award exemplifies the innovative spirit of WellSpan Health, and the efforts of these teams at hospitals across our health system to reimagine care for our patients while keeping the safety of all a top priority.”
The BERT team at each hospital typically includes nursing supervisors, critical care nurses, behavioral health nurses and security officers. Each has a role to play when they respond to an incident. Supervisors lead verbal de-escalation, the critical care nurses assist with medical issues, behavioral health nurses make recommendations regarding medications and behavioral care, and security helps with physical assistance and policy enforcement.
The initiative is part of WellSpan’s commitment to providing trauma-informed care, a more holistic approach at managing behavioral health incidents that focuses on the individual’s underlying mental health and any trauma history they may have.
Since the beginning of 2019, there have been nearly 700 BERT calls documented across WellSpan hospitals, with approximately 75 percent of them successfully de-escalated.
“Especially in light of the extraordinary challenges that COVID-19 has presented Pennsylvania’s hospital community, we are pleased to honor the recipients of the 2020 HAP Achievement Awards,” said Andy Carter, HAP’s president and chief executive officer. “These outstanding projects demonstrate the tireless commitment to excellence that Pennsylvania’s hospital community embodies each and every day. We congratulate the winners for their accomplishments.”
The BERT concept was launched at WellSpan York Hospital and WellSpan Surgery and Rehabilitation Hospital in 2018, and the program has since expanded to WellSpan Good Samaritan Hospital in Lebanon as well as WellSpan Ephrata Community Hospital and WellSpan Philhaven Hospital in Lancaster County. WellSpan anticipates all WellSpan hospitals will have a BERT program in place by the end of 2021.
“Our caregivers have expressed an increased confidence in dealing with potential disruptive or threatening behaviors thanks to the implementation of BERT,” said Jennifer Higgins, BERTProgram Coordinator. “The program has supported the notion that no one should ever feel unsafe inside a WellSpan Health facility.”
For more information on BERT and how WellSpan is committed to keeping patients safe, visit www.WellSpan.org/Quality. For more information on the 2020 HAP Awards, visit https://www.haponline.org/Quality-Safety/Making-Excellent-Better/Achievement-Awards.
About WellSpan
WellSpan Health is an integrated health system that serves the communities of central Pennsylvania and northern Maryland. The organization includes a clinically integrated network of approximately 2,600 physicians and advanced practice providers (APPs), including more than 1,600 employed physicians and APPs; a regional behavioral health organization; a home care organization; eight respected hospitals; approximately 20,000 employees; and more than 200 patient care locations. WellSpan is a charitable, mission-driven organization, committed to exceptional care for all, lifelong wellness and healthy communities. Visit WellSpan.org.