Becker's Spine Review

43 HEALTHCARE NEWS formative channel for our employees to understand the virus and how to stay safe. In a time where the world was put- ting out a lot of conflicting information, we stayed focused on providing a steady supply of accurate, frequent and rele- vant information for our employees. We heard from many employees that they viewed our CEO's updates as their best and most trusted source of information about the pandemic. We appreciate that trust and continue to take that responsi- bility seriously. Dr. Steve Davis: A January surge in COVID-19 and other contagious diseas- es such as flu and RSV prompted us to launch "Operation: One Cincinnati Chil- dren's." Amid the community-wide rise in respiratory illnesses, a significant number of our healthcare providers needed to take off work to care for themselves or their children, which put a strain on our systems. At the same time, we had many non-clinical team members asking what they could do to help. In response, we created opportunities for employees to volunteer for tasks outside of their typical job duties. Over a three- week period, more than 1,000 employees signed up for everything from delivering meals for frontline providers to restock- ing supplies. Some of the volunteers had been working from home for two years because of the pandemic, but they wanted to come on campus to help their colleagues. Our clin- ical people appreciated that the rest of the organization understood their needs and responded quickly. Currently, as staffing gets better, we are reducing the number of areas covered by volunteers. And yet, because many told us they feel even more connected to our mission as a result of their experiences, we are exploring how to continue having employees do such volunteer work on a smaller scale aer COVID-19. e con- nection to mission is key to engagement and joy at work. We have already received inquiries from other hospital systems around the coun- try asking how we accomplished this. e answer is simple: Cincinnati Children's has some of the most dedicated and collabo- rative employees in the world. ey truly make a difference and work as a team, each and every day. n Orthopedic surgeon running for Congress gets AAOS endorsement By Carly Behm T he political action committee of the American Association of Orthopae- dic Surgeons endorsed Al Olszewski, MD, who is running as a Republican for the Western Montana congressional district. Dr. Olszewski is a sports medicine surgeon and has spent six years serving in the Montana State Legislature, according to a Jan. 27 news release emailed to Becker's. He sponsored bills to improve medical liability reform, increase reim- bursement for Medicaid services, prevent unexpected out-of-network medical bills for patients and reform loan forgiveness programs for physicians serving rural communities. Dr. Olszewski also helped pass legislation related to healthcare billing processes and received awards for his bipartisan work from the Montana Medical Society and the Montana Coalition to Prevent Suicide. "I am proud to support a fellow orthopaedic surgeon running for federal office," AAOS President Daniel Guy, MD, said in the news release. "The ongoing health- care crisis shows that we need more physicians in elected office to advocate for our patients, practices, and profession." n NYU Langone increased nonurgent telehealth visits by 4,300% during COVID-19 pandemic By Katie Adams N ew York City-based NYU Langone Health made sweeping expansions to its telehealth program during the COVID-19 pandemic, resulting in an increase of urgent video visits by nearly 700 percent and nonurgent video visits by more than 4,300 percent between March 2 and April 14, 2020, according to a Jan. 31 EpicShare report. Four things to know: NYU Langone established its telehealth strategy in 2016, partnering with Epic and making MyChart the health system's digital entry point for telehealth pa- tients. Within three years, the telehealth program had grown to cover more than 25 specialties. The system rapidly expanded its telehealth program at the beginning of the pandemic, and its communications and marketing team reached out to patients through social media and emails that included links to schedule telehealth visits. In turn, NYU Langone was able to support telehealth visits for more than 8,000 patients each day during mid-April 2020. The number of NYU Langone clinicians conducting video visits increased from about 600 at the beginning of 2020 to more than 5,500 when the pandemic hit. As patients begin to return to more in-person care, NYU Langone predicts that 15 to 20 percent of outpatient encounters will continue to be conducted via telehealth. n

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