Best Docs Network Forest Park Medical Center Austin September 1 2013

Good morning everybody, IÄôm Karla Macias and welcome to another edition of the Best Docs Network featuring Forest Park Medical Center, your destination to better health. Now letÄôs tune into Mac Burt and Dr. Robert Wyatt as they tell us what Forest Park is. WhatÄôs been so rewarding for me to be involved with Forest Park is that Äôve been in the business of helping physicians manage hospitals for 25 years and I have seen all the various models that have been associated over that period of time. Äôve been involved in many different kinds of models and iÄôs been a pleasure for me to implement the model that I think works the best in this business and that is the majority physician owned model where the physicians are in control and govern their own hospital and have business partners like me who come in and help them run that business. But we focus on running the hospital the way that the unique aspects of that medical staff wants their hospital to be run. With the help of the doctors here and at all of our hospitals, we recruit the very best people in all different lines of work from the OR technicians, the floor nurses, quality directors, everyone who walks through this hospital has been very carefully considered. This basically gives our patients the best possible experience. They walk into this place and very quickly are eased of a lot of the stresses of surgery that you get in a cold sterile hospital environment. The people are very friendly, the place is very welcoming all around them and of course the quality of care is unsurpassed. What Forest Park means to a physician is that it provides a place for that physician to practice medicine where he or she is much more in control of their destiny, much more in control of the atmosphere that they practice medicine in. We provide our physicians with dedicated teams of nurses in the operating room who become familiar with the type of surgery that the physician does that makes the surgery go much quicker and enables us to get the room turned over quicker between cases so that the physicians can get more cases done. All of the physicians that I talk to tell me that they are able to get more cases done and in a more efficient manner than any other hospital they practice medicine in. As a physician, a surgeon actually, practicing here we start your cases on time, our turnover is very efficient, we have top quality staff to provide you with the people and the equipment necessary to really be state of the art in everything we do. Did you know that in 2011 Forest Park Medical Center was voted as one of the top 20 most beautiful hospitals in the United States? Also Forest Park Medical Centers were the only hospital in Texas to make this prestigious list. Well, iÄôs a culture of caring and it comes down to the people that occupy the buildings and use the technology, the wonderful processes that weÄôve developed for them, but people really make the difference. For Forest Park we look for people that have got great experience and great skills but weÄôre also looking for people that are passionate about what they do that are compassionate empathetic people, great nurses, great respiratory therapists, great imaging staff. The greeter at our front desk is warm and bright and welcoming and she smiles. And even if you come in and youÄôre uncertain and scared and shÄôs the first face that you see, you will immediately melt your fears away because of the engagement. Just the smile and the compassion that comes through and itÄôs not something you can put on. IÄôs an empathy that people have or donÄôt have, iÄôs one of the traits that we seek. IÄôs a passion about what they do, iÄôs an excellence, itÄôs an attitude and iÄôs every single person. And so we look for that, we search for it. IÄôs not always easy to find, but when yoÄôve got it, every single person that goes into the patientÄôs room from our environmental services folks, all the way through the clinical team, everybody knows what their job is, they know they're an integral part of the team. And our environmental folks are the front line of our infection control, their role is incredibly important. It makes a difference in our care in how they carry themselves throughout their day and present themselves to our patients is very important and iÄôs all about being compassionate, smiling, being optimistic. In Southlake we built our team of 150 people over a relatively short period of time. When youÄôre opening a new facility, the wonderful opportunity you have is you get to build that culture. ItÄôs not there yet, therÄôs not a culture there. TherÄôs a culture for the organization but when you build that hospital and every single person that you hire, you have to be very careful and selective that youÄôre hiring people that are of the culture of caring, compassion, excellence that you really want to continue for Forest Park. So wÄôre creating more than just excellent healthcare outcomes, weÄôre creating memories which is a strange way to think about what we do. WeÄôre healing people and those are tasks and iÄôs clinical but weÄôre also creating potentially memories, experiences for people that theÄôre going to talk about, remember. We want to create an experience that is memorable in every possible good way and that has to do again with our people. How were they treated beyond the clinical care and experience, the outcome is excellent but the thing that is memorable to people is not necessarily how I was put to sleep in anesthesia, iÄôs going to be about how was I treated as a person. Did I walk away feeling like the patient that told me she feels like a princess and this place is like a spa. They had an experience and thatÄôs what they will remember. IÄôs the Disney of healthcare. Forest Park Medical Center has state of the art facilities, the best doctors in Texas as well as the newest technology. For more information on that, logon to our website, bestdocsnetwork.com and click on that Forest Park Medical Center tab. Now on to the doctors, leÄôs hear what they have to say about Forest Park. Forest Park Medical Center is a physician owned hospital in Dallas initially. We began as a group of physicians. The idea before 2007 but it really got serious around that time about developing a small facility that was focused on surgical specialties to deliver efficient, high quality care that we really thought would be the best in the metroplex and build a facility which is I think very patient friendly, very unique and from a physicianÄôs standpoint it has been an extremely unique experience. I ask my patienÄôs all the time if their experience is what they had hoped it would be and we try to meet and in most cases we significantly exceed their expectations. If there are any issues as may come up from time to time, iÄôs something thaÄôs easily addressed because of our attention to detail and our ability with our administration to quickly correct any problems that may be in the process. IÄôs been a really good experience for all of our patients as well as the physicians as a place to practice. What I like about Forest Park is that the hospital itself is centered around the patient and around the doctors. IÄôs centered around the patient in that we strive to give the patient the best possible experience from the moment that they first contact the hospital from that very first phone call to the moment that they walk out that door. And we want to make sure that they feel that theyÄôve had the best care possible. Specifically with regard to the doctors Forest Park creates an atmosphere that allows me to take care of my patients in the best way possible without having to worry about other administrative problems that you commonly encounter in other facilities. What makes Forest Park great is that theyÄôre able to support the physician. When a physician needs something, theyÄôre able to listen to the physician and respond to that and rather quickly. If I need to bring in new equipment like the reflux center they were able to sit down, talk about what the need was, evaluate what the need is and then they went out and bought the equipment. ThaÄôs something that you generally donÄôt see in other hospitals in the area and IÄôve worked in all the major systems. As physicians it allows us to continue to practice an aggressive form of medicine where we feel like weÄôre delivering state of the art care and iÄôs a facility that really fosters that type of physician, that type of mentality. Best Docs Network featuring Forest Park Medical Center is your destination to better health. Still curious about Forest Park Medical Center and its doctors logon to our website, bestdocsnetwork.com and click on that Forest Park Medical Center tab. Now Forest Park Medical Center is not only known for its beautiful hospitals but also that they are designed to heal. Now letÄôs hear more about it from CEO of the Neal Richards Group, Derrick Evers. At Forest Park we really, we call it the six senses of Forest Park and you have your conventional five you know and it talks about the experience that you get from the minute that you come on to our campus. So weÄôre really kind of playing into those senses, so what are you seeing when you first get on the campus and walk into our hospitals? You know are you looking at just great architecture or are you looking at a brighter environment you know with natural sunlight and things of that nature? The art program is something that plays into the healing aspect, the visual aspect. So, yoÄôll see sculpture, yoÄôll see original pieces, youÄôll see print, youÄôll see a little bit of everything. And the way that we attack art is you should feel a little bit uncomfortable with art you know, because if every piece of art in our facilities was something that you absolutely loved then you probably didnÄôt reach the entire community because we all have different tastes, different aspects of what we like. What are you smelling? We have engineered scents in all of our hospitals to where itÄôs an engineering system called scent stream and itÄôs built into our HVAC and the scent that Forest Park has chosen is called clean sheets. Other things that you have just kind of coming into our environment is you know what type of food are you having, the taste. You know we doÄôt have cafeterias we have dining facilities. What are you hearing when you come on to our campus and into our facility as well? Oftentimes in every facility that we do we have water features, both outdoor water features and interior water features. So it provides a calming type sound that resonates throughout our facilities. What are the things that yoÄôre feeling? We have a lot of textural elements associated with our design. When youÄôre coming in, the textural walls, whether itÄôs the stone cut exterior of a lot of our facilities or when yoÄôre coming inside and youÄôre feeling the texture of the fabric itself. You know we really try to play into all of those senses for our patients so you know whether itÄôs in the lobby or itÄôs in the patient rooms or you know the thread count on the sheets, you know, those are the type of texture elements that really you may not instinctively know about those but when you actually touch it and feel it, itÄôll make a difference to you. Every one of our facilities is a minimum of leed silver, so what that means is itÄôs our environmental impact to the community as well. So we have rooftop gardens where you have lush gardens that can be seen from all of our patient rooms, yoÄôre seeing planting, youÄôre seeing stone, yoÄôre seeing in some cases water features associated with even our green roofs but iÄôs something that really kind of plays into the sixth sense of Forest Park which is heal and having a patient room that looks down onto grasses and trees and plants, you know it intrinsically has a healing aspect that really our patients have grown to appreciate. Again wÄôre playing to each of those senses and then our sixth sense is heal because at the end of the day, thatÄôs why wÄôre here. WÄôre here for the community, weÄôre healing patients and providing a place for our physicians to practice medicine. Walking on to our campuses from step one what we really kind of focus on is that entire experience. It should look and feel not like a hospital but it should look more like a hotel. YouÄôre really seeing something different. It has a completely different feel from anything else that youÄôve see in the market. You know our job as developers and as Forest Park Medical Center is to deliver a facility thatÄôs different than what the physicians are used to, what the patients are used to. Forest Park Medical Center isnÄôt only helping around in your community but all parts of the world. Now letÄôs watch as a Forest Park Medical Center doctor lends a hand in Haiti. In 2010 Haiti suffered a big earthquake, I think it was 7.0 on the Richter scale and it was devastating for a couple of reasons. ItÄôs the poorest nation in the western hemisphere and the infrastructures really poor. The buildings donÄôt have codes for earthquakes or anything like that so when the earthquake hit, I mean everything just fell apart. And then being economically poor they really donÄôt have the infrastructure to respond to any kind of emergency like that. They donÄôt have ambulances and fire trucks, they doÄôt have construction equipment all over the place so it was very difficult for them to respond to that. So, one of the first responders if you will to the situation was a medical team from Forest Park Medical Center. They went down to provide medical assistance in evacuating people, triaging people and of course providing treatment, bringing doctors and nurses and supplies and equipment. That in conjunction with one of the charities down there turned into a regular visit where with Sacre Coeur which is the hospital down there we would send a team and participate in surgeries on a regular basis. They would get patients that needed surgery ready, when the team arrived theÄôd spend a week basically operating day and night to treat the cases that otherwise would have been too complex to treat in Haiti. In the United States we have a very robust system thaÄôs very refined. There are safety protocols everywhere, everythinÄôs disposable so nothingÄôs reused but in Haiti iÄôs the polar opposite. YouÄôre operating in a hospital thaÄôs an open air hospital, thereÄôs no air conditioning. The one air conditioner that is in the hospital is in the operative suite because under gowns and stuff it gets very hot, but itÄôs a window air conditioner, the aiÄôs not filled. The instrumentation is very basic from the, you know, 196Äôs. Everything that they have is something thaÄôs been designated from a first world country. Well this is a great opportunity to do what doctors really want to do, I mean this is why you become a physician, because you have this overwhelming compassion anytime you see somebody that is hurting or is sick or is in pain you want to help them. No matter, you know, what it takes, I mean sometimes it becomes a downfall but in this situation youÄôre able to go to a country and really give them something that they really never had access to. In a hundred years they probably wouldÄôt get to it because iÄôs such an economically poor country. I mean when you go there you see iÄôs open sewer systems, the water they get out of the mountainside basically running down and who knows whether iÄôs clean or not. Again the infrastructure is terrible, you know the buildings are half completed. ThereÄôs no disposal system, trash is everywhere and it may not have been like that before the earthquake but certainly it is now. They have basically paralyzed all the infrastructure to the entire country. WeÄôre able to go in there and just help with those situations you know using the expertise that we have. Well Forest Park has really been I think a leader in helping out. When this disaster occurred of course there were other hospitals that sent back teams and there are other hospitals around the United States that sends teams as well but in the metroplex you know Forest Park has been the one thaÄôs routinely gone back to help out, to bring supplies, to lean on our vendors who have been very helpful in when we upgrade our equipment for instance we can take that and use that for the Haiti missions. IÄôs shown a remarkable sense of leadership and a remarkable sense of responsibility that it is to be in the healthcare field for Forest Park to go down there and participate the way they have, not just initially but on a regular basis. Here at Forest Park Medical Center not only do we look locally but we look nationwide for top managers, directors and employees. And not only did we focus on their experience but we focused on customer service because customer service is our number one thing that we look for because we want to treat our patients exceptionally. What impressed me the most about the facility is that they pick the top of the staff that they can find and most of the staff have years and years of experience so when people come here theÄôre getting the best care possible. We were very fortunate. We had a large candidate pool, a lot of applicants that were very interested in working at Forest Park. So we were able to hire the best and the brightest and it was an exciting opportunity to work through all the interviews and really look to focus on not only finding that clinical excellence and knowledge and experience coming from our staff but also those that were really focused on customer service. Those that really wanted to provide patients with outstanding care. Those that really wanted to treat patients as if they were their own family members. We are a surgical specialty hospital and our length of stay is less than two days so we are able to allow our patients to be discharged at less than two days due to our excellent nursing ratios that we have which is 4 to 1 and thatÄôs an outstanding patient ratio that we have so we can really focus on the patient and their needs. Getting what we need for the patients is the most important thing and seeing to the needs of the patients as quick as we can is the most important thing that all of the staff has in common here. We want the recovery to be excellent. We want them to be well, we want them to feel needed, we want them to feel like they get the care that theÄôre paying for. I really enjoy the atmosphere at Forest Park. IÄôs very positive and IÄôm glad that IÄôm with the Forest Park family. IÄôs a great place to work and a great place to be. From staff to surgeons to technology and technique, Forest Park Medical Center brings the best of the best to your area and that includes the best quality care for patients. Now letÄôs hear what some of those patients have to say about their experience at Forest Park. I had 2 surgical procedures at Forest Park. I had bariatric surgery in September and IÄôve had my back surgery in April of this year. The staff at Forest Park was cordial, respectful, the checking in process was done efficiently. There were no surprises. They had called me the evening before to remind me of what I needed to do to prepare myself. I sat in the waiting room a minimal amount of time before I was called back to begin the pre op procedure. In both cases I was in on one day and I was out the very next day and felt very comfortable during the process. Just walking in it did seem like a 5 star hotel but we were greeted at the desk by the concierge that gave my husband a pager and explained to him what the paging system was like. They sent him a text of how I was doing in surgery, where I was at everywhere in the hospital. He was able to see at any screen of where I was and so it gave him a great sense of comfort knowing that even though it was electronic communication but still somebody was letting him know as I moved through the progression of the surgery area, the recovery area, back to my room he knew. It was incredible how the staff made sure that my family was taken care of while I was being taken care of. It felt like I was in a 6 star hotel. The service was great, the people were wonderful. I really felt that I was treated as if they really cared about me and wanted to help me and get me to start recovering quickly. I felt really good being there. I didÄôt feel like I was in a sterile environment, it just felt homey and that was nice because you know when youÄôre not feeling good itÄôs good to be in a place that feels like home and it was a place that felt like home. And my husband was able to stay overnight with me. The nurses, the staff, everyone seemed really happy and ready to help you out. Where IÄôve been to hospitals where it just wasÄôt like that. The rooms at Forest Park were extremely clean, the exterior when you first see Forest Park it does look like a 5 star hotel. Everything about it was a good experience. Did you know that Forest Park Medical Center was voted as one of the top 100 places to work in the Dallas, Fort Worth area? Forest Park Medical Center received this honor for the second year in a row. I think what makes Forest Park unique and different is truly the culture that we have. A lot of places present that they have the patient care and the employee satisfaction in their culture, but when you walk into Forest Park you feel the difference. Our directors over our units are very passionate about what we do and since wÄôre a physician owned facility, the physicians that are here are very involved in the care and in the decisions that we make down to the in-patient level. One thing I really love about Forest Park and I tell everyone that I talk with in my nursing career about Forest Park, I like to talk about the camaraderie thaÄôs here. I really enjoy just a positive, energetic setting with the staff. Everyone works quite well together. Inter department, just you know pharmacy, ER, X-ray, the doctors, the nurses, iÄôs just a really cohesive unit and I really enjoy that. And I fell like every day I come here I enjoy my day and that says a lot because nursing can be really stressful. To be able to come here and feel the support from my teammates and to have a good day at the end of every day, itÄôs something I really appreciate. The best thing about working at Forest Park is that we are a family here. All the directors know each other. We know each other inside and outside of the hospital. We know how to work well with each other and our administration here at Forest Park really appreciates and shows us how much they appreciate us, not in big ways but in small ways every day that really make a difference in the place where you want to work. One thing that really stood out about Forest Park was just the quality of patient care and just the way the patients are treated, the not only high level of patient care thaÄôs delivered but also the entire experience that they receive here. The facility promotes patient satisfaction, patient care which are all things that are very important to me and iÄôs a facility that I feel like are vey in line with their values and what they view. Unless you worked at a hospital like Forest Park yoÄôre going to find that therÄôs a lot to learn, a lot to do and a lot of rewarding experiences to be had here. The things that make Forest Park unique are our focus on whatÄôs best for the patient and whaÄôs best for the physician. WeÄôre different in many ways from other organizations because our physicians are our owners, they are our bosses and to that end we want to do whatever we can to be sure that they get their needs met. WeÄôre here for them, theÄôre here for their patients and working together, wÄôre not fighting a bureaucracy, weÄôre not fighting a corporate office thaÄôs not even in the same state as us sometimes. WeÄôre making whatÄôs best for this hospital at this moment at that time. We doÄôt have to wait and thaÄôs what our physicians like, immediate results. As new things become available like the MAKO robot, some of the new technologies, Forest Park is very quick to want to be a part of those things. If thaÄôs something that our surgeon wants or feels like would benefit his patient population, wÄôre willing to do that for them and thaÄôs exciting to have an organization that leaps forward that quickly. IÄôs much more collaborative, theyÄôre very involved in their choice of equipment. We try to involve them in any major decisions so that they feel that they have a buy into this, theyÄôre a part of it. One of the physicians said to me the other day, I feel like Äôve worked with this team for years because it just got the flow down, it just works. Thank you so much everybody for tuning in to another edition of the Best Docs Network featuring Forest Park Medical Center, your destination to better health. For more information on Forest Park Medical Center, logon to our website bestdocsnetwork.com and click on that Forest Park Medical Center tab. You got questions or comments? Feel free to email us at info@bestdocsnetwork.com. So long everybody, wÄôll see you next week.