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Description:
CommonSpirit Health (CSH) needed a streamlined, scalable process for new nurse, preceptor and mentorship training to reverse the trend of high turnover rates among new nurses and mounting recruitment and hiring costs. CSH had previously been deploying scattered, smaller, localized transition-to-practice (TTP) programs, but with limited L&OD resources, these programs faced constraints in their ability to scale. To create a more uniform experience across the organization, CSH teamed up with OpusVi to standardize the training and education offered to new nurses across the entire health system.
The Challenge:
The staff turnover - especially among bedside registered nurses (RNs) - isn’t just a pervasive issue but also an extremely costly one. According to the 2024 NSI National Health Care Retention & RN Staffing Report, for every 1% change in RN turnover, will cost or save the average hospital $262,500 annually. These costs often include not only the direct expenses of recruiting and training but also the indirect costs such as reduced patient care quality and decreased staff morale.
This system-wide challenge required a robust solution designed to retain nurses and enhance job satisfaction while being built with scalability and consistency in mind to span the entire system.
How We Did It:
OpusVi’s Nurse Residency, Preceptor and Mentor Programs provide evidence-based learning practices, high-impact content and curricula, seamless integration into hospital organizations’ LMS systems and rich data collection in real-time.
This program from OpusVi is delivered in a format that allows CommonSpirit Health to standardize excellence across the entire system by providing a scaled foundation for new nurses transitioning into practice. CommonSpirit Health provided subject matter experts, seasoned clinical educators and executive-level support, while OpusVi provided the framework, program delivery and infrastructure and rich data insights with real-time impact monitoring, delivering ROI for the system.
OpusVi’s Impact Dashboard provides unparalleled rich data to CommonSpirit Health leaders, enabling administrators with unique visibility into a nurse’s transition into practice in real-time, allowing leaders to identify and analyze areas of opportunity for the first time. These insights also provide insight into retention and engagement trends among employees, helping to curb turnover rates and improve employee satisfaction and wellbeing.
Results:
27%
Retention
5M
Annual Cost Savings
42
Cohorts Launched Across 53 Facilities in 21 States
The implementation of this comprehensive training and mentorship program yielded significant results including:
- Increased Nurse Retention: In the first year following implementation, nurse retention rates at CSH climbed to over 92%, a notable improvement from pre-implementation rates.
- Cost Savings: The cost of turnover can have a profound impact on diminishing hospital margins. According to the 2023 NSI National Health Care Retention & RN Staffing Report, the average cost of turnover for a bedside RN is $56,300, meaning this residency program contributed to an estimated $16.3M in cost savings.
- Standardization Across the Board: By scaling evidence-based and standardized curricular content throughout the entire system across 24 states, OpusVi helped ensure all nurses across CSH facilities benefited from consistent and high-quality training, leading to high reliability, strong risk management practices and reduced legal liability.
The strategic collaboration between CommonSpirit Health and OpusVi illustrates the effectiveness of targeted, evidence-based, data-informed training programs in addressing critical challenges in healthcare staffing. These workforce development strategies have led to transformative outcomes for CommonSpirit Health staff, the patients they serve and the cost-savings and efficiencies for the system at large.
Next Steps:
Over the next five years, OpusVi and CommonSpirit plan to develop training programs for 4 additional specialty areas per year, expanding the delivery of the program to over 45,000 nurses across 14 states and 8 specialties.
Kathleen Sanford, CNO of CommonSpirit Health
"I am proud to witness the profound impact our nurse residency program has had on our nursing staff. This program has been instrumental in bridging the gap between academic knowledge and real-world clinical practice, providing our new nurses with the support, confidence, and skills they need to excel. The residency program not only enhances their clinical competence but also significantly boosts their job satisfaction and retention. Our nurses feel more prepared and resilient, which directly translates into improved patient outcomes and a stronger, more cohesive healthcare team."
About CommonSpirit Health
CommonSpirit Health is a nonprofit, Catholic health system dedicated to advancing health for all people. It was created in February 2019 by Catholic Health Initiatives and Dignity Health. With its national office in Chicago and a team of over 175,000 employees and 25,000 physicians and advanced practice clinicians, CommonSpirit operates 145 hospitals and more than 2,200 care sites across 24 states. In FY 2022, CommonSpirit had revenues of $33.9 billion and provided $4.9 billion in charity care, community benefit, and unreimbursed government programs. Learn more at www.commonspirit.org.
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