For Immediate Release
Holland Bloorview hosts first Canadian Schwartz Center Rounds®
Internationally recognized program advancing compassionate care
Toronto, April 9, 2015 – Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital is the first hospital in Canada to partner with the internationally renowned Schwartz Center for Compassionate Healthcare, a non-profit organization dedicated to strengthening the relationship between patients and caregivers.
“Providing our clients and families with compassionate care is deeply rooted in our values and put into action every day,” says Dr. Keith Adamson, PhD, Senior Director of Collaborative Practice at Holland Bloorview. “In today’s fast-paced, cost-conscious healthcare environment, it’s becoming increasingly challenging for clinicians to balance between the need for efficient verses compassionate care. We know that providing our employees with a structured and safe outlet for expressing their feelings will lead to better health outcomes for our patients.”
Today, the hospital hosted their first Schwartz Center Rounds®, the signature program that brings employees together to openly and honestly discuss the most challenging emotional and social issues they face in caring for patients and families. The Schwartz Center Rounds program has been found to enhance compassionate care, improve teamwork and reduce caregiver stress.
For employees at Holland Bloorview, caring for children with complex medical needs means developing long-standing, meaningful relationships, often seeing children from infancy right up until they transfer into adult care. Along the way, relationships develop and often difficult conversations take place.
Unlike traditional medical rounds, the focus of Schwartz Center Rounds is on the human dimension of healthcare. Employees from across the hospital are all invited to come together and share their experiences, thoughts and feelings on a range of topics drawn from actual patient cases. The principle is that caregivers are better able to make personal connections with patients, families and colleagues when they have greater insight into their own feelings.
Schwartz Center Rounds were first piloted at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston in 1997. Since then, the program has grown rapidly as the need has increased. Today, Schwartz Center Rounds are conducted at more than 450 hospitals and healthcare institutions across the United States and in the United Kingdom.
According to a comprehensive evaluation of the program published in Academic Medicine, the journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), the Schwartz Center Rounds strengthen the patient-caregiver relationship and remind caregivers why they entered the healthcare field in the first place. Caregivers who participated in multiple Rounds sessions reported:
- Increased insight into the social and emotional aspects of patient care, increased feelings of compassion toward patients, and increased readiness to respond to patients’ and families’ needs
- Decreased feelings of stress and isolation, and more openness to receiving and giving support
“The Schwartz Center for Compassionate Care has built an incredible program that has become the gold standard in providing support to clinicians,” says Adamson. “We knew we had to be part of it.”
“From all indications, the need for a program like Schwartz Center Rounds is great,” said Julie Rosen, Executive Director of the Schwarz Center. “In a national US survey we conducted in 2011, more than 80 per cent of patients said they believe that good communication and emotional support can make a difference in how well patients recover from illness and even whether they live or die. Yet their ratings of how well their caregivers demonstrated compassionate care fell short of their expectations.”
“We congratulate Holland Bloorview on recognizing the importance of the patient-caregiver relationship, and we look forward to working with them to advance compassionate care for all patients and families,” she added.
About Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital
Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital is Canada’s largest children’s rehabilitation hospital focused on improving the lives of kids with disabilities. Holland Bloorview is a global leader in applied research, teaching and learning, and client and family centred care. We are a provincial resource transforming care for children with cerebral palsy, acquired brain injury including concussion, muscular dystrophy, amputation, epilepsy, spina bifida, arthritis, cleft-lip and palate, autism and other physical and developmental disabilities. Our vision is to create a world of possibility for kids with disability.
About The Schwartz Center for Compassionate Healthcare
The Schwartz Center for Compassionate Healthcare is a nonprofit organization dedicated to nurturing patient-caregiver relationships to strengthen the human connection at the heart of healthcare. Research shows that when caregivers are compassionate, patients do better and caregivers rediscover their passion for healing. The Center believes that a strong patient-caregiver relationship characterized by effective communication, emotional support, mutual trust and respect, and the involvement of families in healthcare decisions is fundamental to high-quality healthcare. Visit us at www.theschwartzcenter.org or follow us on Facebook or Twitter.
Media Contact:
Jennifer Obeid, Manager of Communications, Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital
647.404.3198| jobeid@hollandbloorview.ca
Petra Langer, Senior Director of Communications, The Schwartz Center
781.640.0086 | planger@theschwartzcenter.org
