Member, Endoscopy Quality Council – Island Health

Help us make endoscopy services on Vancouver Island the very best they can be! The Endoscopy Quality Council wants to involve patients in the development of a patient-centred evidence based endoscopy program.

Open to: Patient partners in the Island Health region

Lead Organization or Department

Endoscopy, Island Health

Aim

The Endoscopy Quality Council strives to ensure high-quality, standardized and equitable care for all patients with endoscopy needs wherever they live within the Island Health region. The Council is committed to the development of a high quality program and understands the patient and family experience of care is crucial to the achievement of this goal. Much of the Council’s work focuses on learning for improvement. The inclusion of patient representatives at quarterly meetings will help to ensure that patients inform improvements to policies and procedures. Patient representatives will be invited to consider their experiences of care within the program in order to provide feedback on the topics discussed at each meeting.

Level of Engagement

This opportunity is at the level of involve on the spectrum of engagement (www.iap2.org). The promise to you is that the health care partner will involve patients in planning and design phases to ensure ideas or concerns are considered and reflected in alternatives and recommendations.

Eligibility

• Patients, family members, or informal caregivers who have experience with Endoscopy care available through Island Health.
• Comfort with participating in committee and working group settings, including sharing lived experiences in a group setting for the purposes of quality improvement.
• Willing to travel to meetings at a hospital site near you.
• If you have a strong interest in this work but have not yet completed a PVN orientation and Volunteer Agreement, are unsure if your experience is a good fit or feel another format of engagement would work better with your availability, please contact Leah Smith directly.
• The placement process for this opportunity may include an informal interview between the volunteer and the health care partner.

Logistics

• Vacancies: 1-2
• Date and time: Meetings are usually held quarterly from 0700-1000
• Location: In-person attendance via video conference at an Island Health site near you.
• Term: 1 year with the option of renewal.
• Time commitment: Attendance at quarterly meetings lasting approximately 3 hours.
• Materials will be provided prior to each meeting and should be reviewed in advance in order to contribute to the facilitated, decision-focused discussions. Review of meeting materials may take approximately 1 to 2 hours.

Reimbursement

Mileage and parking will be reimbursed, as well as approved transit (e.g. bus fare).

Background

Endoscopy service is offered across Vancouver Island at West Coast General Hospital, Campbell River Hospital, Comox Valley Hospital (opening October 2017), Nanaimo Regional General Hospital, Cowichan District Hospital, Saanich Peninsula Hospital, Lady Minto Hospital, Victoria General Hospital and Royal Jubilee Hospital. Services include screening and symptomatic colonoscopy, gastroscopy, endoscopic retrograde cholangio-pancreatography, endoscopic ultrasound and bronchoscopy. The Council is responsible to set and ensure consistent standards and processes exist to support high quality care for patients experiencing Endoscopy care. This includes understanding and learning from patient safety events and feedback from our patients and clients. Click here  to learn more about how the Endoscopy Quality Council is using quality improvement data to keep patients safe and inform its improvement activities.  Council membership includes specialist physicians, senior managers, front-line leaders and clinicians from who are responsible for the delivery of Endoscopy and related services. More information about Island Health’s quality councils or ‘Quality Structures’ is available here.

Health Care Partner Contact Information

Leah Smith
Engagement Leader, Patient and Public Engagement | Southern Vancouver Island
778.678.3977
lsmith@bcpsqc.ca