Resort-Style Attention Puts Patients at Ease at Barnes-Jewish Hospital

April 14, 2016 At Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, several customer-oriented programs are deeply integrated into the facility’s framework to help people feel truly comfortable with the care they receive.

Such customer-focused programs include (among many others) concierge services through the Washington University and Barnes-Jewish Heart & Vascular Center.

Barnes-Jewish is a member of BJC HealthCare, which provides a full range of health care services through its 12 hospitals and more than 100 health care sites in Missouri and Illinois. Its service area includes a radius of approximately 250 to 300 miles surrounding St. Louis, which means that some patients must travel several hours or even longer to access the hospital’s services, including those through the Heart & Vascular Center, which opened its doors about six years ago.

A stay at the Heart & Vascular Center, which contains 260 inpatient beds and is in a tower of the main building, begins with a “warm welcome” from someone who greets new patients at the entrance and escorts them to their destination, says Patti Crimmins Reda, Executive Director of the Washington University and Barnes-Jewish Heart & Vascular Center.

If this sounds more like a resort than a hospital, that’s the idea, she says, since a visit to a cardiovascular unit can be a stressful event, and the staff tries to help people feel more at ease.

The concierge team consists of three dedicated concierge representatives, two dedicated Advanced Practice Registered Nurses (APRN), and one office coordinator to keep things flowing smoothly. The patient care representatives round on the rooms twice a day and offer reading materials, electronics such as iPads, laptops, and DVD players and movies on DVD, along with adult coloring books, extra blankets, and anything else to help pass the time in the most comfortable way. In addition, the staff helps family members arrange lodging nearby and can also provide them with access to a shower and even laundry facilities on-site if needed.

Further, if patients are lonely or seem to be struggling emotionally, the concierge will work with the clinical staff to make sure all of the patient’s needs are met.

For more on how Barnes-Jewish makes patients feel comfortable in an inherently high-stress setting, leading to higher patient satisfaction scores, read our full article now: Special Treatment, Please: Barnes-Jewish Hospital’s Welcoming Approach Makes Patients Feel at Home.

Best regards,
Matt Humphrey
President