Super star stories: CDI Week open house remembrance

Mary Lindenboom, RN, BSN, CCDS, (at the time of this article's original release) CDI specialist at Flagler Hospital in St. Augustine, Fla., sent these photos along with a break-down of her facility’s CDI Week festivities back in September. The team decorated their offices with CDI tips and graphs illustrating the successes of its CDI efforts and held an “open house” inviting physicians and other coworkers to stop by for a visit.

They offered coffee and deserts, made candy bar wrappers with the CDI Week logo, put them on Hershey bars and handed them out to the physicians while rounding on the hospital floors.

“It is amazing the smiles we got from the docs when we were giving them a treat instead of asking for a clarification,” says Lindenboom, who hopes to have even greater participation when she hosts next year’s open house and related activities.

Lindenboom isn’t alone. A number of facilities hosted open houses, or passed out goodie bags of one sort or another. (Click here to download the special section which shows photos of various facility celebrations.) Many created educational games or hosted seminars to help promote the benefits of CDI efforts.

That’s the whole intent behind CDI Week. Held annually the third week in September, its mission is to help get the word out about changes to the IPPS and to the ICD-9 (and soon to be ICD-10) code sets but also as a means to:

• To recognize the unique skills and expertise of CDI specialists
• To increase public awareness of the CDI profession
• To positively affect the personal and organizational performance of CDI specialists
• To provide broader education on the importance of the quality connection of documentation of care

To that end, ACDIS volunteers and administrators created a toolkit with free downloadable PowerPoint presentations, webinars, logos, posters with this year’s theme, sample activities, and other items. Throughout the week ACDIS members receive a daily Q&A on CDI emerging trends as well as an annual industry benchmarking survey.