When you choose Swedish Covenant Hospital to care for your health, you are healing in the hands of nurses who exemplify the highest professional standards. And we can give you our best because our colleagues have confidence in us. Our collective ability to provide you with excellent patient care depends on the key role that nurses play in coordinating all the elements of your care.
The pride that we take in our work is obvious when we talk about our nursing experiences. The compassion is clear in our voices when we talk about grateful acknowledgment from patients and their families, and special stories of connection and healing. We feel like we're making a real contribution, and our achievements as nurses make us proud of ourselves as accomplished professionals, and as compassionate people.
Our management solicits our opinions in shaping policies and procedures, which makes us feel valued and supported. Wherever good ideas about improving quality of care come from, we keep the threads of communication open so those ideas can be heard and responded to. Nurses also influence our professional culture from the bottom up, as staff nurses are entrusted with the autonomy to make recommendations, especially through the chain of command.
And we have an ally at the top. Nursing decisions are shaped by the Directors of Nursing and our exceptional Chief Nursing Officer Mary Shehan, who is well known for being open and approachable by everyone at Swedish Covenant. Mary reinforces the tight knit of our group by participating in all committees, and conveying the concerns and goals of many small groups to the board, which addresses all nursing issues related to staffing and patient care. She also reports directly to the Chief Executive Officer, to whom she voices the concerns and represents the views of all nurses.
Every month Swedish Covenant recognizes employees from all areas of our organization who are nominated by patients, visitors, and co-workers for the STAR (Special Thanks and Recognition) Employee of the Month Award. This honor goes to those who provide outstanding hospitality, and demonstrate compassion and innovation. Recipients include everyone from laboratory staff to food service workers and public safety personnel - and lots and lots of nurses.
Having seen the value of having all the parts of the Swedish Covenant team actively communicating with each other, our Division of Nursing tries to ensure the presence of a nurse on each committee in the hospital. We contribute to creating a robust healing environment in our regular nursing duties, and in many other ways as well. Nurses are an active presence in departments including Patient Education, Information Systems, Community Relations, Government Relations, Human Resources.
Our supportive working environment and the respect we enjoy among our colleagues lets us feel confident about our ability to help you heal. When we evaluate our quality of care with professional evaluation tools, we are confident in saying we are always improving. And when we ask you to relate your experience of the nursing care we give you, we are proud to know that we are doing very well, and we're only getting better.
To learn more about our Journey to Magnet Excellence, click here. For more information about Nursing at Swedish Covenant Hospital, please call the Nursing Administration office at (773) 878-8200, Ext. 5600.
