De-Clutter Initiative is springboard for 'culture change'
WVU Healthcare’s De-Clutter Initiative is much more than a spring cleaning. It’s a culture change that will not only focus on cleaning up the organization's facilities, including Ruby Memorial Hospital, but also on the way it stores, inventories, dispenses and orders equipment.
The initiative, developed by the Center of Excellence’s Personal Space Accountability Committee, began earlier this week as dumpsters were placed on each hospital floor to collect obsolete materials such as outdated forms, paperwork and other trash.
Following trash collection, beginning Monday, April 6, representatives from Materials Management will collect equipment from floors that departments and units have tagged either as obsolete for a surplus item or as a frequently used item that will be stored in one of three areas. A minimum quantity of essential equipment will be stored in Materials Management on the fourth floor of Ruby. Beds, isolettes, cribettes and similar items will be stored on the third floor of the Mary Babb Randolph Cancer Center in the Health Sciences building. Excess items will be stored in ROC 2 and be circulated back to Materials Management as needed.
Beginning Tuesday, April 7, departments can order items through an icon on CONNECT, and Materials Management will deliver them within an hour.
“We’ve been waiting for something like this and we’re getting buy-in and support organization-wide,” said WVU Healthcare Assistant Vice President of Support Services Mike Ortiz. “It’s exciting. We can’t wait to get started on this.”
A cleaner look will have multiple benefits, the most obvious being a building that looks more appealing to patients and the public. But de-cluttering hallways and other areas will make them easier to clean and help Environmental Services staff work more efficiently, Ortiz said.
Items in the central storage will be sanitized, repaired and replaced if necessary. Through examining the inventory, Materials Management staff can also determine if similar items came from multiple vendors. Eventually, those items could be purchased from the same vendor, possibly saving money through a standard purchase.
After the cleanup, the committee will work on a plan on how best to use the existing space for items remaining on the patient care units.
“We want to make sure the corrals, alcoves and areas that have been de-cluttered don’t end up being cluttered again with other equipment,” Ortiz said.
The next steps will include unit rounding for monitoring and review of signage. The goal is to achieve standardization of signs to create a more professional presentation, Ortiz said.
WVU Healthcare’s De-Clutter Initiative is much more than a spring cleaning. It’s a culture change that will not only focus on cleaning up the organization's facilities, including Ruby Memorial Hospital, but also on the way it stores, inventories, dispenses and orders equipment.
The initiative, developed by the Center of Excellence’s Personal Space Accountability Committee, began earlier this week as dumpsters were placed on each hospital floor to collect obsolete materials such as outdated forms, paperwork and other trash.
Following trash collection, beginning Monday, April 6, representatives from Materials Management will collect equipment from floors that departments and units have tagged either as obsolete for a surplus item or as a frequently used item that will be stored in one of three areas. A minimum quantity of essential equipment will be stored in Materials Management on the fourth floor of Ruby. Beds, isolettes, cribettes and similar items will be stored on the third floor of the Mary Babb Randolph Cancer Center in the Health Sciences building. Excess items will be stored in ROC 2 and be circulated back to Materials Management as needed.
Beginning Tuesday, April 7, departments can order items through an icon on CONNECT, and Materials Management will deliver them within an hour.
“We’ve been waiting for something like this and we’re getting buy-in and support organization-wide,” said WVU Healthcare Assistant Vice President of Support Services Mike Ortiz. “It’s exciting. We can’t wait to get started on this.”
A cleaner look will have multiple benefits, the most obvious being a building that looks more appealing to patients and the public. But de-cluttering hallways and other areas will make them easier to clean and help Environmental Services staff work more efficiently, Ortiz said.
Items in the central storage will be sanitized, repaired and replaced if necessary. Through examining the inventory, Materials Management staff can also determine if similar items came from multiple vendors. Eventually, those items could be purchased from the same vendor, possibly saving money through a standard purchase.
After the cleanup, the committee will work on a plan on how best to use the existing space for items remaining on the patient care units.
“We want to make sure the corrals, alcoves and areas that have been de-cluttered don’t end up being cluttered again with other equipment,” Ortiz said.
The next steps will include unit rounding for monitoring and review of signage. The goal is to achieve standardization of signs to create a more professional presentation, Ortiz said.