CHEST 2019 marked the inaugural FISH Bowl competition for attendees. Inspired by Shark Tank, our kinder, gentler, yet still competitive and cutting-edge FISH Bowl (Furthering Innovation and Science for Health) featured CHEST members disrupting our beliefs about how clinical care and education are performed. As health-care providers, they presented innovative ideas pertaining to education and clinical disease for pulmonary, critical care, and sleep medicine. Six finalists were chosen from dozens of submissions, and three emerged winners. In this new Meet the FISH Bowl Finalists series, CHEST introduces you to many of them – including the People’s Choice Award winning team that includes Dr. Russ Acevedo, Wendy Fascia, and Jennifer Pedley.
Names: Russ Acevedo, MD, FCCP; Wendy Fascia MA, RRT; Jennifer Pedley, RRT
Institutional Affiliation: Crouse Health
Title: Crouse Lung PaRTners
Brief Summary of Submission: The goal of our program is to improve the quality of life for patients with COPD by establishing a primary life-long relationship with a respiratory therapist who ensures that they and their caretakers have a thorough understanding of the disease process, as well as the ability to carry out prescribed therapy, obtain resources, and reach out for help once they leave the hospital.
Once enrolled in the Lung Partners Program, patients receive an in-depth initial assessment and daily assessments by a team of specially trained, primary respiratory therapists who will screen them for health literacy, physical functionality, anxiety, depression, sleep disorders, nutrition, and medication management.
Clinical protocols are in place to allow for optimal treatment plans in an efficient timeframe and to assist in timely referral of patients to specialists for further assessment and follow-up.
1. What inspired your innovation? By maximizing the Respiratory Care department efficiency, this allowed for the ability of a primary respiratory care inpatient disease management program. This allows us to use our respiratory therapists to the full extent of their licensure.
2. Who do you think can benefit most from it, and why? We feel this will most benefit the patients, the respiratory therapists, and our physician partners. In the end, the major benefit is to decrease health-care fractionation.
3. What do you see as challenges to your innovation gaining widespread acceptance? How can they be overcome? To be successful, there needs to be very strong direction from the medical director. We do a poor job in training our fellows to be strong medical directors. Increasing attention to training our fellows in the science of respiratory care will help to overcome this challenge.
Getting the word out is also a challenge that can be overcome by increased exposure of our program like we are receiving from the Fish Bowl Competition and presentations at national meetings.
4. What impact has winning Fish Bowl 2019 had on your vision for the innovation? The positive feedback and networking from our winning has confirmed the value of our program. We have received many requests for our Lung Partner Handbook.
5. How do you think your success at Fish Bowl 2019 will continue to impact your career overall in the months and years to come? We would like to grow our involvement in state and national leadership. In all that we have learned in the development and implementation of Lung Partners, we can help support other local and national COPD initiatives.