Latest / Becker’s Healthcare -- Pediatric Leadership Podcast / Kirsten Provart, Patient Care Supervisor of the Lactation Program at Children's Minnesota

Transcript

Kirsten Provart, Patient Care Supervisor of the Lactation Program at Children's Minnesota · Becker’s Healthcare -- Pediatric Leadership Podcast

• 0:03
  It's so important for leaders at the top of organizations to keep learning,
• 0:07
  stay sharp, grow their networks,
• 0:09
  help our audience better do this in a more simplified, personalized,
• 0:12
  and meaningful way. Becker's Healthcare has launched my bhc,
• 0:16
  it's your trusted Becker's healthcare experience and more with content,
• 0:19
  connections, events and learning opportunities.
• 0:22
  Join the community free of charge@www.my dot becker's hospital
• 0:27
  review.com and we'll see you there.
• 0:33
  This is Christos with the Becker's Healthcare Podcast.
• 0:36
  I'm thrilled today to be joined by Kirsten Probar,
• 0:38
  patient care supervisor of lactation program at Children's Minnesota.
• 0:42
  We connected with her to discuss the health system's effort to provide mothers
• 0:45
  with breast pumps. Kirsten, thank you so much for joining us today.
• 0:49
  Thank you for having me. I'm thrilled to be here.
• 0:53
  Excellent.
• 0:53
  Could you please introduce yourself and tell us about your background?
• 0:56
  Yes, absolutely. So I am Kirsten Prova, as Chris said,
• 1:00
  I am currently the patient care supervisor of one of our nurseries here at
• 1:04
  Children Minnesota, as well as our lactation program.
• 1:08
  Prior to my supervisor role,
• 1:10
  I worked on our neonatal float team here at Children's for a few years.
• 1:13
  I started at Children's as a brand new, new grad rn,
• 1:16
  and so this has been my career at Children's.
• 1:18
  I am very honored to be an employee here.
• 1:22
  Kirsten, as I mentioned,
• 1:24
  children's Minnesota has a program to provide mothers with breast pumps.
• 1:28
  It's all part of your health equity efforts over at Children's Minnesota,
• 1:31
  something that many hospitals health systems speak about and want to get
• 1:35
  rolling. Uh,
• 1:36
  could you tell me how did the idea to loan breast pumps to mothers involve,
• 1:40
  evolve,
• 1:41
  and what personal personnel rather and resources have been needed to implement
• 1:45
  it?
• 1:46
  Absolutely, yes.
• 1:47
  Children's has a commitment to our patient families to provide more equitable
• 1:52
  care. And so in that we now own 20 portable hospital grade breast
• 1:57
  pumps that are available to moms free of charge while their child is here in our
• 2:02
  hospital at Children's Minnesota. While in the hospital,
• 2:04
  many of our newborns aren't able to breastfeed immediately after delivery,
• 2:08
  which leaves their moms dependent on a pump to initiate and ma maintain that
• 2:13
  milk supply.
• 2:14
  And most breast pumps we realize are designed to support an already existing
• 2:18
  milk supply,
• 2:19
  but it often takes that hospital grade pump to really successfully start that
• 2:23
  milk supply if the newborn is not at the breast.
• 2:26
  So our lactation consultants know this and saw a gap where many of our
• 2:31
  patient mothers were unable to obtain that hospital grade breast pump and were
• 2:35
  therefore struggling to make the milk that they needed to feed their baby.
• 2:40
  So they saw that came up with the solution,
• 2:43
  and then you asked what personnel and resources.
• 2:45
  It was one of these programs that many,
• 2:48
  many people around the org touched in order to get it from conception to launch.
• 2:52
  Um, our lactation team worked very closely with our compliance team,
• 2:57
  our team from legal and finance,
• 2:58
  all to really make this program become what it is today. Breast,
• 3:03
  a breast pump company will run a rental program from themselves.
• 3:09
  Um, and we had looked into doing that, but then really realized,
• 3:13
  wouldn't it be cool if we could just run, like,
• 3:15
  if we could just purchase these pumps outright and run the program ourselves so
• 3:19
  we're not dealing with an outside vendor. So that's,
• 3:22
  we pioneered the hospital owning the project, um,
• 3:26
  and really having this fleet at our disposal versus going through
• 3:31
  an outside party.
• 3:33
  Kirsten,
• 3:34
  how many people have availed themselves of the program so far and what's the
• 3:38
  feedback that been like?
• 3:39
  Yes, so we went live on March 1st of this year, and since GoLive,
• 3:44
  we have completed 23 loan agreements where the pump was loaned out,
• 3:48
  used and returned back to us,
• 3:50
  and those 23 pumps supported 29 neonates, which is so exciting.
• 3:56
  Um, on an average day,
• 3:57
  we would say between 75 to 85% of our 20 pumps are loaned out,
• 4:02
  and the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. Um,
• 4:06
  we have had mothers who have unexpectedly delivered early whose pump was not
• 4:10
  scheduled to be delivered for a few more weeks.
• 4:12
  We've seen mothers who were using a pump that was causing pain with pumping.
• 4:17
  Um, we were able to help a mom who is here unexpectedly from out of town who
• 4:21
  delivered unexpectedly who did not have access to the pump that she had back
• 4:25
  home.
• 4:25
  And all of those moms have just been so thankful for the ability to use the pump
• 4:29
  and that it's helped with their effective feeding,
• 4:32
  which has in turn created a good milk supply for them to give their babies.
• 4:37
  Uh, as you said,
• 4:37
  it's only been about a couple of months since you've had this program,
• 4:40
  but what have you learned about the need to be flexible?
• 4:43
  Certainly you touched on that a little bit, but yeah.
• 4:45
  What have you learned about what you need to do with this program moving
• 4:49
  forward?
• 4:50
  Yes, absolutely. Since the program is brand new, um,
• 4:55
  we are learning every day with the needs that our moms have and how to meet
• 4:58
  them. And so each day that when we come to work and work with these mothers,
• 5:02
  we are figuring out the needs that they have and how we can best support them
• 5:06
  and make sure that this pump program is helping them first and foremost.
• 5:10
  And so if that is bending to, um,
• 5:13
  the needs of when and where they need to return the pump or how they need to
• 5:16
  pick the pump up, we are just trying to make sure that it is, um,
• 5:20
  fair and equitable to all of the mothers who have our pumps. And that really,
• 5:24
  at the end of the day, it is benefiting their milk supply,
• 5:27
  which in turn is benefiting our patients here at Children's Minnesota.
• 5:32
  How do you make sure that everything is fair and equitable with the program?
• 5:36
  Yeah, absolutely. We,
• 5:38
  I think the biggest thing with learning about being fair and equitable is that
• 5:43
  not every situation will look the same because not every mother's situation is
• 5:47
  the same. And so really with that health equity,
• 5:51
  it's not that every single person that comes in will see these exact same,
• 5:55
  you know, step one, step two,
• 5:57
  step three because if we're being equitable to them,
• 5:59
  we realize those steps may not work for them. And so I think it's,
• 6:03
  it's been a learning opportunity for all of us to know we design a program,
• 6:08
  you write out every single detail and then you grow along the way.
• 6:12
  When you realize to meet these needs,
• 6:14
  they might not be returned in the patient's room as we stated on the sheet.
• 6:18
  You know,
• 6:18
  it might be meeting the mom at their next follow up appointment because she
• 6:23
  didn't have a ride to bring it in earlier than that. And so knowing that, hey,
• 6:27
  we're gonna meet her where she is at and we're still gonna get the pump back,
• 6:30
  and she still had the opportunity to use it,
• 6:32
  but it is fair and equitable than to all involved.
• 6:36
  That makes sense to me. Certainly.
• 6:39
  Were you able to draw from other programs that are similar or as far as you
• 6:43
  know, were you starting this all from scratch?
• 6:46
  We really started the pump rental program from str, um, scratch,
• 6:51
  but we were able to draw from our,
• 6:53
  our compliance and legal team really helped us with the outline of the program
• 6:58
  with other programs in the org when it just came to generally, you know,
• 7:03
  how do you get a program from conception to launch?
• 7:05
  They really were able to walk us through step-by-step,
• 7:08
  here's what a loan agreement should look like. And so in that regard,
• 7:12
  we definitely pulled from many different areas of children's,
• 7:16
  but in regards to having a pump loaner program,
• 7:19
  we really created it from the ground up here at Children's.
• 7:25
  On the subject of healthcare equity.
• 7:27
  Do you know of any other programs at Children's Minnesota now that you have the
• 7:30
  lactation program off the ground that might be able to follow in its footsteps?
• 7:36
  Yes, absolutely. Children's Minnesota.
• 7:39
  We remain committed to health equity and looking at this issue from all facets
• 7:43
  of care. Um, as the kid experts,
• 7:46
  that's what we call ourselves here we are on a mission to champion these health
• 7:50
  needs of all of the children and families in our community.
• 7:53
  One of another program that we have is our neonatal virtual care,
• 7:58
  um, which is a program that provides on demand care
• 8:03
  management for newborns that need that immediate and acute stabilization and
• 8:07
  resuscitation.
• 8:09
  It allows for regional and rural hospitals to
• 8:13
  electronically connect with our neonatologists and neonatal nurse practitioners
• 8:18
  here at Children's to immediately have that connection to see and hear what is
• 8:23
  happening in their delivery rooms and operating rooms to help in
• 8:28
  the moment.
• 8:28
  And that program launched in 2018 and has had great success and we're really
• 8:32
  hoping to continue with that and help grow that program to reach any other
• 8:37
  area hospital, be that in Minnesota or Wisconsin,
• 8:40
  to provide that equitable care to ensure that all of our neonates are getting
• 8:44
  that critical acute life-saving care that they need right at delivery.
• 8:49
  Kirsten is certainly important to speak about healthcare equity.
• 8:52
  As I mentioned before, it's a subject that needs a spotlight.
• 8:57
  How has it become as big as it is within Children's Minnesota?
• 9:01
  How has the awareness grown and why is it so important?
• 9:05
  Yeah, absolutely. I do think, as you said, it is, uh,
• 9:09
  an issue that deserves the brightest spotlight.
• 9:11
  I think we are all realizing that we all have areas that we can grow and do
• 9:15
  better as we learn about people.
• 9:17
  And Children's really puts that as the forefront is as we learn about each
• 9:21
  individual patient and family who walks through our doors,
• 9:24
  children's makes an effort to meet them where they are and make sure that they
• 9:29
  are receiving the best care possible. And so I just think we are,
• 9:33
  we're excited to be pioneers in this work.
• 9:36
  We're excited to have this be a forefront.
• 9:37
  We're excited about the ability to be able to be highlighted here,
• 9:40
  to speak about the many efforts and programs that we have that really help us
• 9:45
  meet our patient and family where they're at.
• 9:50
  Ki thank you so much for your time and insights today.
• 9:53
  If we look forward to connecting with you soon.
• 9:56
  Thank you so much for having me.