MOUNTAIN HOME, TN—The audiology staff at the James H. Quillen/Mountain Home VA Medical Center have received the National Veterans Health Administration Systems Redesign Champion Award. They were selected for the honor by the Under Secretary for Health for improving the efficiency of the Hearing Aid Evaluation Clinic without compromising the effectiveness of service delivery
Prior to January 2010, the Hearing Aid Clinic issued hearing aids in 60-minute appointments that included the evaluation/fitting of the hearing aids and counseling (orientation) with the audiologist. As the patient load increased, from 15,117 to 17,345 people a year, veterans had to wait 12 to 15 weeks following their evaluation before being fitted with hearing aids.
But when the clinic began using the VA’s TAMMCS (Team-Aim-Map-Measure-Change-Sustain) process, hearing aids were issued in 30-minute appointments with the audiologist followed by a 60-minute group orientation conducted by other team members. This resulted in an additional 56 hearing aid fittings a month, which decreased the wait time for hearing aids to only 3 weeks after the hearing evaluation
Despite the shortened fitting appointments, audiologists at the clinic continued to use real-ear measures to verify accuracy of the hearing aid fitting. Moreover, the actual face time with patients increased from an hour to 90 minutes.
Winning staff members were invited to attend the 2011 National Systems Redesign Improvement Forum in Las Vegas.
