Increasing Patient Referrals to Make-A-Wish
For the past two years, Dr. Cassady Hossenlopp has been on a mission to reach more patients with critical rheumatology and nephrology conditions at Levine Children’s Hospital.
Dr. Hossenlopp is currently the Chief Resident at LCH. In 2019, she was challenged to select a focus area to improve quality of care for LCH patients. After learning that the hospital was missing the opportunity to refer a significant number of eligible children for a wish, she designed a project focused on increasing patient referrals for Make-A-Wish.
Dr. Cassady Hossenlopp
The aim of the project was to increase the number of monthly referrals for qualifying pediatric patients in rheumatology and nephrology – two clinics that are more likely to overlook eligible patients. Dr. Hossenlopp felt passionate to pursue the project for two reasons. First, she recognized that wishes give patients and families the opportunity for life-changing experiences that can heal and inspire. Second, her nephew had received a wish, so she had seen and experienced the impact of a wish.
Dr. Hossenlopp and her team created a strategy to increase referrals by providing education and bringing awareness to providers and staff about Make-A-Wish. They created new materials to place in work areas, as well as developed new processes to identify and refer eligible children efficiently and effectively. They conducted a survey to gather feedback on medical team’s perception of the referral process and found:
- 85% of providers think about Make-A-Wish on a case-by-case basis while the other 15% think about it daily or monthly.
- 66% of the time, providers do not consider a referral until the end of clinic and/or after patient has already left.
- 50% of providers felt that Make-A-Wish prompts were helpful or would be helpful to remember to refer a child.
With this information, Dr. Hossenlopp and her team continued to seek new tools and resources to educate and engage the providers and medical teams. A few of these changes consisted of displaying photos and stories of wish kids referred from the clinic, adding eligibility criteria to the social work reports, and including Make-A-Wish information to communication systems amongst providers.
The project saw great success between the summer of 2019 and March of 2020. As the world faced the unprecedented challenges of COVID-19, so too did the project. Between March and October 2020, qualified referrals from the two clinics remained predominantly below baseline. Medical teams were struggling to maintain a normal workload and it was a challenge to talk to families about other resources, such as Make-A-Wish. Dr. Hossenlopp and her team stayed dedicated to the project, however, and continued constant communication with the chapter.
The project concluded with impact: February 2021 had the most nephrology and rheumatology referrals since starting the initiative, and the projected reached its goals four times in the last six months!
Although the official project has ended, the work of engaging medical teams remains. The clinics continue to seek best practices for including Make-A-Wish criteria in weekly pre-visit planning reports with social work, as well as developing effective ways to prompt providers and staff to think about Make-A-Wish eligibility. There is also the possibility for a new resident to pick up the project and expand to a different specialty area.
Our chapter is grateful for the passion, time, and energy that Dr. Hossenlopp and her team dedicated to this project. Now, more than ever, wish kids need the healing power of a wish – a different type of treatment that medical teams can prescribe and celebrate.
The team consisted of Dr. Hossenlopp, Talia Buitrago-Mogolla, MHA CPQ (QI Coach), Karen Emmerton, MS CCLS (QI Coach), Annie Huhnerkoch (social work), Laura Cary (social work), Ashley Creft (social work), Shari Schefer (social work), and Dr. Sheetal Vora.