Knox's Blog

And now, here’s the moment you’ve all been waiting for! Drum roll please ….. I lost 18 pounds! Alright, I know, this is not a world record and not that monumental in the grand scheme of things. However, I am more impressed with what I gained than with what I lost.

I gained a new found appreciation for the importance of camaraderie with my fellow teammates. Together we encouraged each other, shared tips, suggestions, accomplishments and issues.

I gained more energy. This did not come right away though. In the beginning, it was painful and boring. It was painful to pass up on so many of the foods that I love. It was painful to hardwire new habits. Exercise was boring at times. But I learned to shake it up and add a variety of work-outs into my routine. And in a short amount of time, I began to feel healthier. Some of my newfound energy was psychological in that I was proud of myself for sticking to the plan, but in time it also became physical. I now understand the concept of “runner’s high.” Once you are on the exercise path, you don’t want to stop. There are days when I drive home thinking up excuses not to hit the trail, but then I realize I really do want to work out. If nothing else, it’s a great way to relieve tension after a tough day.

And finally, I gained a better sense of self. Getting through to the other side was not always easy, but I did it. I changed my habits through more nutritious and thought-out meals. I donned my sweats and moved a lot more and now my clothes fit better.

They say it takes 30 days to break a habit. Changing ingrained behavior patterns is never easy. Nothing happens by chance though. It is our thoughts that build our character and our circumstances in life are created by our thoughts. So, going forward, I will remember all I have gained rather than the pounds I lost. And now, I would like to challenge you! What old habits can we as the Inova team break in order to make our future challenges easier? Let’s work together to lose our old “weights” and gain momentum as we head into these new challenging times ahead.

As promised, I am also announcing a winner to the “Guess My Weight” contest. The winner is Ilcias Vargas, Cardio Invasive Specialist at Inova Alexandria Hospital and he wins a gift card for a sporting goods store – congratulations!

Did you know that April 22 is Earth Day? For more than 40 years, Earth Day has inspired and mobilized individuals and organizations worldwide to demonstrate their commitment to environmental protection and sustainability.

And we here at Inova have found our own unique way to celebrate our commitment to not only providing world-class services and care, but doing it in a sustainable way that is responsible to our environment. We are inspired to do this year round (not just on Earth Day!). For example, did you know that:

•  Inova Health System hospitals recycled over 2 million pounds in 2010
• An update to the sterilization equipment at one Inova location saved 1,154,250 gallons of water over the course of a year. That’s almost enough to fill two full-sized Olympic swimming pools!
• Inova Health System has been using new and innovative energy efficiency technology such as LED lights. This helps reduce our carbon footprint.

So what is planned for Earth Day this year at Inova? We have activities all around our System, including:

Inova Fairfax Hospital:

• We had an Electronic Waste/Shred/Baby Seat take-back event on Wednesday
• On Friday at 10 a.m., we’ll have a tree-planting ceremony and a seedling giveaway in the atrium from 11:30 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Inova Fair Oaks Hospital:

• On Wednesday, we had a Farmer’s Market
• On Friday, we’ll be holding a tree-planting and tree-giveaway ceremony, and we’ll be shredding paper and having an electronic waste take-back event

Inova Loudoun Hospital:

• There was a tree-planting ceremony at both the Lansdowne and Cornwall campuses today, along with a tre- seedlings giveaway
• Also, on Earth Day the Lovettsville Co-op will be providing educational information on eating locally grown foods and we’ll be hosting a Food Drive to benefit Loudoun Interfaith

Last, but not least,  Inova Alexandria Hospital at noon, our System Office will also be holding tree-planting ceremonies tomorrow at Cambridge at 1:30 p.m. and Telestar at 1:50 p.m.

You can learn more about Inova’s commitment to the community and all Earth Day events at: www.inova.org/sustainability.

For this Earth Day, I am proud that Inova is acting as a responsible member of our community and showing our commitment to our environment. What are you doing to help celebrate the Earth this year?

This has been an eventful week. I met with our Research Council where I had the chance to speak with researchers, physicians and administrators to review our research efforts. We discussed how to apply the results of their work from “bench to bedside,” so to speak. We also dialogued about the importance of research efforts for clinical education and for continually improving the care we provide.

This week I also had the pleasure of meeting with our newly formed Innovation Steering Committee. This is an exciting work group formed to help guide us about ways to learn from each other’s innovative techniques and ideas, and empower each other to apply innovation internally here at Inova. Innovation and empowerment are key to us continuing to grow and move forward on our vision. I’m looking forward to speaking with you more about our vision in the coming weeks and months.

This week has been full of informative conversations. I am excited to continue to discuss ways that we continually innovate and improve. Enjoy the weekend!

What was the first big-ticket item that you ever saved for? Do you remember saving for a new car, (just out of curiosity, what make/model/year was your first car?) or sacrificing some “creature comforts” to save enough down payment for your first house? What were some of the things that you had to give up in order to meet your savings goals? Did you have to sacrifice eating out? New clothes? Entertainment? Learning to control our desire for immediate satisfaction in order to reach our larger goals, give and get is all part of moving into adulthood.

For many, the first real example of this is in college. Students invest tens of thousand of dollars for an education that won’t pay off until years later. Sometimes students are even forced to take out student loans in order to pay for tuition.  They make these investments all while suffering through 4 years of questionable dinning hall cuisine, endless packages of Ramen, used or no personal transportation, and thrift store clothing. However, most college students are willing to invest in the future, and endure the journey to get there, in hopes that their vision and sacrifice will pay off.

The Inova leadership team has been talking about our new vision for some time now.  Because our business, government budgets, and many of us as individuals are about to collapse under the cost burden of health care, we know we have to REINVENT how we care for our patients and their families. We have to create a new system of care that is fundamentally different from the old one – a new system that focuses on the prevention of illness (not just curing people after they get sick), that focuses on individual needs (rather than generalizations about entire populations), that employs new models of teamwork and that engages patients as part of the care team.

In short, we have envisioned a whole new Inova focused on optimizing each unique individual’s health and well-being, by working together in new ways as an efficient, effective, interdependent team. It is what our community demands and what our patients deserve. And frankly, it’s what will make our work rewarding and purposeful.

The only way we are going to be able to make this new vision a reality is if we all understand the direction and join in the sacrifice.  This will require lots of changes both large and small. Many of the large changes will involve bringing major new information systems to reality and building new strengths in genomics and investigational treatments. Other changes will involve smaller investments that, if done on a large scale, will make a big difference.

Here are a few examples of some of the small investments we could make in order to reach our larger goals:

• Helping your departments and care teams improve patient flow in order to reduce waiting time.  This process change could involve patients or internal coworkers who we serve in our daily work. By making necessary changes to eliminate waste, we serve more people in the same amount of space in your department.
• Washing our hands to prevent infections, which cost a lot to treat and often injure or could even kill our patients.
• Using supplies carefully so there is little waste. Let’s remember that many of our patients have to pay for the care we provide directly from their pockets.
• Turning off computers overnight to save energy costs, since the environment and the sustainability of this planet may well depend upon our ability to curb our consumption of energy.
• Preventing delays in tests so patients can go home earlier. Patients and their families want this change and we all want to reduce the costs that burden our patients and society at large.
• Using equipment with care to avoid need for costly repairs – a form of waste that everyone can help control and reduce.
• Teaching patients how to manage their care when they get home so that they are not readmitted to the hospital (e.g. diabetics, patients with heart failure).

Ok, what am I missing? I am looking for you to make some simple improvements. I need your help looking for opportunities to reduce waste, improve the safety and quality of our work and reduce costs. Small, simple investments, if done on a large scale, will make significant contributions to the investments we need to make to achieve our long-term vision.  I am hoping that you’ll share suggestions or reports of improvement you’ve tried in your department that others need to know about. Please, take a minute to make an “investment” suggestion that helps us reduce our costs or improve our patients’ experiences.

Together, we are smarter than any one of us is alone. We can achieve our new vision by reinventing the savings we identify together.

Thanks for all you do!

Knox