Abby Serakowski takes the reins in bringing AHN improvement project to life

Nearly a million venous thromboembolisms (VTE) – a condition where blood clots form in the veins – happen in the U.S. each year. VTE is most common among older people but can occur at any age. 30 to 70 percent of all VTE events occur during hospitalizations and in the three months immediately after discharge.

Second-year MHA student Abby Serakowski is completing an extended residency with Allegheny Health Network’s (AHN) Executive Nursing team, giving her first-hand experience to both the clinical and administrative sides of nursing leadership.

AHN's Executive Nursing Team at an event (Credit: Abby Serakowski)

“Much of my work has focused on project management and supporting quality/patient safety initiatives in areas such as wound care and VTE prevention,” said Serakowski.

With wound care, she’s coordinated workgroups exploring digital care, wound treatment associate standardizations and expansion, growing wound ostomy and continence nursing and developing academic partnerships.

Abby Serakowski

Serakowski says she has been brought into leadership meetings, steering committees and digital innovation initiatives, allowing her to learn from leaders across several disciplines and backgrounds and see how strategies are implemented across a massive health care system.

“I’ve worked with our Talent Acquisition Program, recently renamed to Remarkable Nursing, Leapfrog quality compliance, nursing microsite projects, and Nurses Week activities,” she adds.

Her work has also supported AHN’s VTE prevention efforts, including patient and staff education and enhancements to dashboards that track patient statistics within the Epic electronic medical record system.

When asked to lead an initiative at AHN’s West Penn Hospital, Serakowski jumped in on the management side to coordinate the various parts of the project and shepherd the work from ideas and plans on paper to implementation.

“One area I’ve been particularly involved in is mobility. I designed and ordered signage that will be displayed throughout West Penn to encourage and support patient mobility,” she said. “I’ve also helped develop workflows for our mobility initiative, including work around expanding the team through new roles such as Mobility Technicians and Exercise Physiologists who can help patients safely get up and moving.”

The work isn’t just about the product the patients see; it’s also required her to write summaries to keep hospital leaders updated, garner support for the work in other parts of the system and coordinate meetings to keep stakeholders aligned, informed and moving forward.

“It’s been really rewarding to see the project progress and to have the opportunity to contribute to an initiative that can improve patient outcomes while also creating significant cost savings for West Penn,” she said.

Serakowski credits her success to foundations built in the classroom. “My Human Resources Management in Health Care and Public Health Professions course helped me think through what the structure of new roles could look like,” she said, adding that classes like the required health insurance course gave her the experience needed to develop and map workflows in Microsoft Visio, and that the quality assessment and patient safety course has helped frame the project through the lens of patient safety and quality improvement.

Heading into her second year of the MHA program, Serakowski said she has a better understanding of what it takes to move a project from idea to action and will bring that to class projects and group work, especially those focusing on process improvement, project management, and system operations. “I’ve also gained a better understanding of the importance of communication and collaboration when working with people across different areas of an organization,” she added.

AHN's Executive Nursing Team and Chief Nursing Officers at a Pittsburgh Pirates game.
(Credit: Abby Serakowski)

Her experience has also influenced her academic choices – opting to take electives focused on bettering her project management skills. “Moving forward in my career, I think these skills will be especially valuable as I work on initiatives that require collaboration across different teams and levels of an organization.

As she looks ahead to what comes after graduation next spring, Serakowski says she has a greater appreciation for the role nurses play in health care. Before joining AHN, she had experience on the administrative and operational side of health care. Now, after her time with AHN Executive Nursing, she better understands the clinical side's needs and functions, as well as the challenges nurses face every day.

“It has made me more interested in a career where I can work closely with clinical teams and contribute to multidisciplinary initiatives,” she said. “I’ve learned how important it is for administrators to understand and listen to the perspectives of those providing care to move projects forward successfully”

Residencies, whether extended or summer, are part of the MHA curriculum, and Serakowski said she is grateful to take part in it.

“I don’t think you fully appreciate how valuable the experience is until you’re in the middle of it and able to see firsthand how much you can learn by being immersed in a health care organization,” she said. “I think this is something that really differentiates our program from other institutions, and I feel very fortunate to have this opportunity.”

- Mike Friend