The Orlando Health PROMISE and What It Means To You

For many years in the healthcare industry, the measure of success was primarily focused on medical outcomes. As long as the broken bone was properly set, or the infection brought under control, little else mattered. If the surgery was a success and the patient was recovering, all the medical professionals involved must have done their jobs and done them well.

Over the past 20 years, the measure of success has been expanded beyond only the medical outcome and now clearly includes every interaction a patient has during his or her healthcare experience.  To address this inclusive focus, we developed The Orlando Health PROMISE, which resulted from asking a simple question: What about the patients and their experiences?

Our mission at Orlando Health is to make every single patient experience an outstanding one. Clearly, by optimizing the patient experience, we can all contribute substantially to Orlando Health’s fiscal success as a healthcare organization. Patient experiences directly affect our reputation both within the community and within the healthcare field.

More important, however, delivering the best possible patient experience, which reduces the patient’s emotional stress during treatment, will positively impact their clinical results. In other words, it’s better for the patients’ health.

The PROMISE is made up of seven key areas of focus:

            P         Positive Attitude
            R         Respect
            O         Ownership
            M         Mindfulness
            I           Inclusiveness
            S         Superior Communication
            E         Exceed Expectations

The Orlando Health PROMISE was developed to communicate that we are all expected to work toward achieving the best possible experience for every single patient, as well as how to do it. While these seven principles, as outlined by the PROMISE, are fairly easy to follow, they have the power to have an enormously positive impact on our patients.

Positive Attitude

Every day, make the decision that you are going to have a positive attitude. While we all have both good days and bad days, it is an Orlando Health expectation that we have a positive attitude with each other, as well as with our patients and guests.

Respect

In the healthcare field, the best way you can respect your patients is to minimize suffering. While some pain and suffering can’t be avoided due to the patient’s medical condition, we can reduce suffering that results from not putting their needs first, especially emotional suffering. Avoidable suffering includes things like not returning calls, forgetting to deliver on a promise or making too much noise when they’re trying to sleep.

Ownership

Taking ownership of a problem is a three-step process: See it. Own it. Solve it. It means being personally accountable for creating outstanding patient experiences by not procrastinating, not blaming others when things go badly, and not feeling like a victim. And often, it means doing things you might not think are part of “your job,” like picking up a piece of trash on the floor or helping someone else’s patient. Ownership means that it actually is part of your job.

Mindfulness

The patients you care for are more than just your job. They’re people, with emotions and needs and questions. Being mindful means that the patient is always more important to you than the task. As a healthcare worker, it’s easy to start thinking of your patients as the “heart attack,” or the “breast cancer,” or the “kidney transplant.” That’s not who they are. They’re husbands and wives, sisters and brothers, sons and daughters.

Inclusiveness

In an inclusive work environment, you treat everyone with dignity and respect, and make sure everyone feels valued. This is important because teamwork among colleagues is necessary to create the best possible patient experience. You can do your part by approaching someone you’ve never talked to before and striking up a conversation, especially someone who seems to keep to themselves, possibly because they’re new. Also, get to know all kinds of people, regardless of stereotypes.

Superior Communication

Sometimes we forget that, while everything we do in our jobs seems routine, it’s new and at times a little scary to our patients. We can help them feel more at ease by simply communicating with them. Keep them informed by explaining routines and discussing their plan of care. Just as important, listen attentively when they’re speaking to you and answer their questions.

Exceed Expectations

Finally, make it your goal to provide a far better experience than your patients expected. Anticipate the patient’s needs and take care of them right away. Make the patient feel important and pampered by doing something thoughtful that they’re not expecting. And remember, little things can go a long way.

The poet Maya Angelou once wrote, “People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” That’s what the Orlando Health PROMISE is all about: focusing on how we make our patients feel and delivering an experience they will remember positively.