UW Health Monona Earns Award for Quality Improvement Efforts

Staff at UW Health Monona celebrated with a clinic potluck as they received the 2007 James E. Davis Award for Quality Improvement. Jim Davis, MD, MS and Maggie Dugan, RN, MS presented the award. Optimizing HealthLink functionality and promoting teamwork in meeting patient and provider needs were two areas that earned the Monona project high rankings.

The Monona team, led by Ann Evensen, MD, created a protocol to triage vaginitis complaints in adult non pregnant patients. Primary team members included:

• Nan Pieper, LPN,
• Beverly Epp, RN and
• Bonnie Kleczka, Clinic Manager.

Other reception, support and clinical staff helped review and test the protocol.

The goal for the project was to create a protocol for nursing staff to use with patients requesting phone treatment for vaginitis symptoms. If fully implemented, the protocol would be expected to reduce the number of phone calls sent to the physician for review from 96% to 17%. Dr. Evensen led this project as a part of her Primary Care Faculty Development Fellowship. The James E. Davis Award was established in 2001 to recognize the ongoing work of quality teams throughout the Department of Family Medicine.