Hospital Dispenses Soothing Strategy:
Springfield's Hospital Uses Art, Music, Massages, Therapy,
and Pets to Humanize Patient's Experience
by Janet Filips
SPRINGFIELD, OR (AP) - In the day-surgery waiting room at McKenzie-Willamette Hospital, loved ones sit, alone or in clusters, clutching their coffee cups and their fears.
Then Christine Gilliland arrives, uncovers her harp, wraps herself around the instrument and at the behest of the hospital sends the lilting sounds of its strings across the room. The music relaxes and distracts 53-year-old Sue Wilson as she waits for word of her mother's condition in the beige-painted waiting area, its walls hung with a garland of autumn leaves and self-portraits by second-graders.
The plucked strings remind her of a wind chime she bought last summer for her deck, she said; the harp soothes her in a similar way. On another day, a massage therapist might soothingly massage the feet or backs of patients and family members. Or a certified pet therapy dog, a chocolate-and-yellow Lab mix named Garth, might pay a visit. And every day, pediatric patients snuggle against handmade stuffed animals or homemade quilts that are theirs to take home.
With a combination of small-town touches, unexpected alternative therapies and flexible policies, McKenzie-Willamette Hospital strives on a shoestring budget to add a warm touch to the antiseptic, tension-filled world of medical care. The 114-bed community hospital is an acute care facility with a state-of-the-art diagnostic imaging center, an emergency department that meets the state standard as a Level II trauma center and an occupational medicine program that serves more than 1,500 area employers.
Visiting hours? They're around the clock. Miss your pet cat terribly during recovery from surgery? If Fluffy is current with her shots, she can drop by your room or a waiting area if your roommate is allergic to cats. Turned off by the artwork in your room in the intensive care unit? You can select another piece from a rotating art gallery.
Having a baby? An in-room Jacuzzi will help you through labor. And when it's time to go home, baby's head will be topped with a one-of-a-kind soft stocking cap knit by a hospital volunteer.
"We have found our new parents are very appreciative of a handmade item rather than something you can buy by the gross and plop on babies' heads," said Thelma Clemons, the hospital's volunteer coordinator. "These are special keepsake items."
Kathy Deacon, the hospital's chief operating officer, said the 44-year-old institution has a long-standing, Top-to-bottom commitment to "humanize the hospital experience," a commitment that intensified during the 1990's.
A half-dozen hospitals in Oregon, including McKenzie-Willamette, stick out as leaders in the approach, said Ken Rutledge, president of the Oregon Association of Hospital and Health Systems. "I think it's a direction that increasingly we're going to see hospitals going in," he said.
Giving newborns hand-knit caps is not unique in Oregon, Rutledge said, "but it's very smart." "Around the state, there are other smaller hospitals that have found and latched onto the same thing," he said. The winning formula, Rutledge said, involves niceties that patients appreciate an understanding of today's medical consumer and a culture in the organization, from top to bottom, that believes in blending Western clinical approaches with spiritual and emotional approaches to healing.
Big hospitals know they need to deliver care more holistically, Rutledge said; most are not there yet because "it's much easier to turn a small boat than a larger ship."
Volunteer, employee effort Volunteers and employees are a big piece of the mind- body-spirit effort. For instance, Garth, the Lab, comes calling on the day off of his owner, Sandi Arrington, a registered nurse at the hospital.
Another employee arranged a hallway concert involving her daughter's chamber music group at the University of Oregon. And massage therapists come to the hospital via three paths: Jan Locke, a licensed massage therapist, works for the hospital eight hours a week, giving massages and coordinating two volunteer programs involving senior students and graduate interns. A $1,000 grant from employees helps support the massage therapy program.
This year, the hospital budgeted $2,000 for an annual membership to the Acchord Music Access Project. The group periodically sends musicians, such as Gilliland, the harpist, to fill hospital hallways and waiting areas with mellow sounds. "There are so many things we do here that are painful and scary and intrusive," said Hannah Thomassen, director of nursing and the person who forged the link between the Cascade Institute and the hospital.
Relaxing, complementary approaches, she said, provide a good counterpoint to the medical treatments.
Music without words means leaving behind the mind. And leaving behind the mind is meditation.
Meditation returns you to the source. And the source of all is sound. — Kabir
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