The Handoff

"It starts with you, but it's not about you." That's the mantra of today's guests when it comes to nurse leadership. Dr. Lucy Leclerc and Dr. Kay Kennedy are passionate about helping nurse leaders improve their skills by focusing first on personal transformation, and they have a book on this topic coming out before the end of the year.

Lucy and Kay's work is inspired by the idea that healthcare leadership is distinct from other industries and requires a new approach that is evidence based and human centered.

In this episode, they talk with Dan about qualities of the "end of earth leader" — the person who inspires their employees to follow them anywhere -- why nurse leaders need to think about self-care as a discipline, and why it's okay not to have all of the answers

Links to recommended reading:

• Human-Centered Leadership in Healthcare (Book Pre-Order)
• Human-Centered Leadership: Creating Change From the Inside Out
• Human-centred leadership in health care: A contemporary nursing leadership theory generated via constructivist grounded theory
• Human-Centered Leadership in Health Care An Idea That's Time Has Come
• AACN Healthy Work Environments Assessment Tool

The full transcript for this episode can be found here: http://www.trustedhealth.com/the-handoff-podcast/lucy-kay

Our guest for this episode has spent his entire career in healthcare education, trying to close the gap between education and practice and give clinicians and healthcare leaders the skills they need to be successful.

Today, Geoffrey Roche is a Senior Vice President at Dignity Health Global Education, where he helps create professional development and higher education programs that are shaped by the current, real-world needs of hospitals.

In his conversation with Dan, Geoffrey shares the latest themes that he's seeing in academia and healthcare leadership, what today's nursing students are looking for from their education, and why the healthcare industry needs to do more to foster and engage the next generation of leaders.

Links to recommended reading:

• Dignity Health Global Education Equity Impact Scholarship
• Dignity Health Global Education Certificate in Nurse Leadership

The full transcript for this episode can be found here: http://www.trustedhealth.com/the-handoff-podcast/geoffrey-roche

Workplace violence against nurses has been a longstanding issue, particularly in the ED. A landmark study published by the Emergency Nurses Association in 2011 found that more than half of emergency nurses had been the victim of workplace violence in the preceding seven days, and a third had considered leaving the profession as a direct result.

My guest today is a 20-year veteran of the ED and the Director of the Institute of Emergency Nursing Research who brings her training as an anthropologist to the study of nursing culture and how it contributes to the various forms of workplace violence.

In this conversation, Dr. Lisa Wolf and I discuss her definition of workplace violence, which includes not just violence perpetrated by patients, but also organizational violence and the role that it plays in creating a culture of aggression and withholding.

Dr. Wolf shares insights from her significant research on this topic, as well as strategies for nurse leaders to address it within their organizations.

Links to recommended reading:

• Workplace Violence by Vaughan Bowie
• Nothing Changes, Nobody Cares: Understanding the Experience of Emergency Nurses Physically or Verbally Assaulted While Providing Care
• Violence Against Nurses Working in US Emergency Departments
• Guiding Principles: Mitigating Violence in the Workplace

The full transcript for this episode can be found here: http://www.trustedhealth.com/the-handoff-podcast/lisa-wolf

The Handoff will return from summer break in September with a brand new season.

The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed the nursing profession into a new and uncertain chapter. Nurses have never played a more vital role in our healthcare system, but they've also never faced more challenges, including burnout and mental health issues, massive generational differences amongst nurses, staff shortages and structural racism.

We've been hard at work lining up guests who can speak to how nurse leaders can cope with these challenges, while managing their own career progression, leadership abilities and mental well-being. We'll hope you'll tune in!

In honor of Pride Month, we're re-releasing our interview with Dr. James Simmons, a nurse practitioner and thought leader who has appeared everywhere from Good Morning America to CBS and NBC to People magazine. He's also amassed a large social following on Twitter and Instagram, where he answers health-related questions from the public at the handle @AsktheNP.

James is an outspoken advocate of both the Black and LGBTQ+ communities, and in his conversation with Dr. Nurse Dan, he talks candidly about the inequities that the pandemic has laid bare, and why "going back to normal" isn't an option for these individuals.

In this episode, James speaks plainly about how the system has let down and left out these communities and what nurses and nurse leaders can do to make a difference moving forward.

Links to recommended reading:

• Meet James Simmons of Ask The NP in Greater LA
• Nurse Practitioner Documents Getting The COVID Vaccine - What To Expect
• Healthcare and Cultural Considerations for Patients
• How Nurses Can Help Dismantle Racial Healthcare Disparity
• The Handoff Episode 44: Making nursing more diverse
• The Handoff Episode 45: What the ANA is doing to combat racism in nursing

The full transcript for this episode can be found here: www.trustedhealth.com/the-handoff-podcast/james-simmons

We're wrapping up season three of the show with a very special episode in honor of Nurses Week 2021 and Mental Health Awareness Month. Joining Dr. Nurse Dan are two very special nurses who have been working on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic: Tayler Oakes and Tina Vinsant.

Tayler, Tina and Dan had a very candid conversation about what the last year has been like for them, how their mental health and overall well-being has been impacted and what they wish their facilities and the healthcare system as a whole would do differently to support nurses.

We also had a chance to get Tina and Tayler's reactions to Trusted Health's second annual study on frontline nurse mental health and well-being, which looks at how the pandemic has impacted nurses, their career plans and their commitment to nursing

Links to recommended reading:

• 2021 Frontline Nurse Mental Health & Well-being Survey
• Recognizing and Avoiding Nurse Burnout
• The Sound of Silence: The Occurrence of PTSD in Nursing

The full transcript for this episode can be found here: https://www.trustedhealth.com/the-handoff-podcast/tina-tayler

Our guest for this episode is one of the leading voices in the conversation around clinician mental health. Dr. Bernadette Melnyk is the Vice President for Health Promotion, the University Chief Wellness Officer, and the dean of the College of Nursing at The Ohio State University. She is nationally recognized as an expert on evidence-based approaches to a wide range of healthcare and wellness challenges.

She and Dr. Nurse Dan talk about how nurses are coping as the COVID-19 pandemic passes the one year mark, and why Dr. Melnyk thinks there is a mental health crisis lurking in our healthcare workforce. She shares her thoughts on the evidence-based techniques that can improve nurses' well-being, the role of skills building and cognitive behavioral therapy in treating anxiety and depression, and why the idea that resiliency is an innate trait is a myth.

Dr. Melnyk also shares her thoughts on why wellness leadership is so important in healthcare, academia and corporate America, and why we need to change our healthcare paradigm from sick care to well care.

Links to recommended reading:

• The Ohio State University College of Nursing
• Taking Action Against Clinician Burnout: A Systems Approach to Professional Well-Being
• Trusted Health & Ohio State University College of Nursing Wellness Partner Program
• Trusted Health Mental Health Resource Center

The full transcript for this episode can be found here: https://www.trustedhealth.com/the-handoff-podcast/bernadette-melnyk

Our guests for this episode are pushing healthcare leaders to shed their old ideas about leadership and develop a new, healthier and more collaborative approach to managing teams and facilitating change. Dr. Kathy Scott and Bridget Sarikas are the founders of L3 Fusion, a boutique consulting firm whose approach is informed by their dual clinical and business expertise. They are also the co-authors of the new book "Stupid Gone Viral," which proposes a novel approach to leadership that is centered on science, experimentation and humor.

Bridget, Kathy and Dr. Nurse Dan talk about the importance of prioritizing one's own physical, mental and spiritual well-being before attempting to lead, why top-down leadership needs to end, and strategies for developing trust and communication within your organization. They talk about their concepts of "grit and grace" in leadership, as well as their preference for "kindness before rightness" in communication.

Kathy is a former bedside nurse who has served in a variety of C-level positions within healthcare organizations, and is a Fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives. Bridget is an expert in process improvement, financial planning and analysis, investor relations and communication, and has served in executive roles at organizations like Southcoast Health and Howard University

Links to recommended reading:

• L3 Fusion
• Stupid Gone Viral

The full transcript for this episode can be found here: https://www.trustedhealth.com/the-handoff-podcast/kathy-bridget

Our guest for this episode is Dr. Scharmaine Lawson, a nationally recognized and award-winning nurse practitioner. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing and the American Association of Nurse Practitioners, and a winner of New Orleans magazine's Healthcare Hero award.

Dr. Lawson has a thriving housecall practice in New Orleans, which she started in 2004. She takes a non-traditional, holistic approach to care, seeking to gain a deeper understanding of her patients' lifestyles through the unique insights that in-home care provides. She is also passionate about exposing young children to advanced practice nursing and is the author of a book series entitled Nola The Nurse.

She and Dan talk about everything from how her housecall practice has evolved in the time of COVID, what inspired her to write a children's book, and her advice for nurses trying to decide whether advanced practice is right for them.

Links to recommended reading:

• Dr. Lawson NP - Medical Housecall Training, Housecalls
• Nola the Nurse
• The Ultimate Advanced Practice Nursing Guide

The full transcript for this episode can be found here: https://www.trustedhealth.com/the-handoff-podcast/scharmaine-lawson

The pandemic has upended many things in healthcare, one of which is the way we think about nurse staffing. Our guest for this episode is Betty Jo Rocchio, Senior Vice President & System Chief Nursing Officer for Mercy.

Mercy has been in the midst of rolling out a new hub-based approach to their nursing workforce that allows them to more flexibly staff up and down with full-time and contingent nurses. During the pandemic, Mercy organized its workforce around regional pods and used a data-driven approach that allowed them to more easily move nurses through the system to meet the needs of different regions.

Betty Jo details their process, how it will be used moving forward and how she thinks the pandemic has changed what nurses want from their jobs.

Links to recommended reading:

• Mercy Nursing Careers
• Travel Nursing Basics

The full transcript for this episode can be found here: https://www.trustedhealth.com/the-handoff-podcast/bettyjo-rocchio