Speaker Interview

Dr. Noura AlMadani, Director of Nursing Performance Management / General Directorate of Nursing, Ministry of Health Saudi Arabia

What would your advice be to aspiring or current leaders on how they can be effective leaders in healthcare quality and how they can influence patient experience?

The Key concepts related to leadership are influence, communication, group process, goal attainment, and motivation. Being in the Ministry of Health for many years; I faced many challenges and learned a lot. What I can advise to all our aspiring healthcare quality leaders to be effective leader is always focus on the practice of caring for patients in ways that are meaningful and valuable to the individual patient. In addition, involve patients in the process of decision-making, recognizing their values and preferences, and treat them with dignity, respect, and sensitivity to cultural values. Since patient experience is about people interaction, organization culture, patient perception and the continuum of their care. We as leaders has a vital role on inspiring and empowering others to enact a change. To effectively motivate others to improve quality and give them the authority to implement new processes that aligned with the current transformation and Vision 2030.

What are some of the nursing initiatives taken by MOH to improve patient experience?

MOH Nursing conducted different projects, workshops and training programs where staff are thought about empathy, good communication, involving patient in their care and efficient delivery of care. All this was evaluated thru quality indicators focus on patient’s safety and staff performance. An example of one important project is improve work environment for nursing practice that aims to assess the nurse work environment at 43 hospitals in order to support the Ministry of Health in creating working conditions with positive practice environments that improve nurses’ job satisfaction, enhance or attenuate a nurse’s ability to practice nursing skillfully and deliver high quality care to increase patient satisfaction.

What are some of the challenges faced by nursing leaders in establishing an optimal patient experience across the organization?

Health care nursing leaders are faced many critical challenges such as lack of patient centricity, workloads, serious safety and quality issues, and workforce shortages in nurses. In spite of difficulty, all this taught us that it is crucial to prepare nurses for their transformational key roles in the delivery of an exceptional patient experience that included in the model of care. This challenge our leaders is somehow to structure the knowledge, skills, and abilities required so that our nurse will be equipped to step into roles that are needed for the current national transformation program 2020.

How do you think the Congress will impact healthcare providers in aim achieve patient excellence and drive patient centricity and why is such a platform important for the healthcare sector in the region?

Conducting a congress like will be a great start to introduce awareness of the current transformation in the healthcare system and educate healthcare professionals in provision of patient excellent healthcare service. Since patient experience is for all healthcare professionals collaborative work is essential for good outcome to underpins the real need to find out the best work force that can work together effectively to deliver the kind patient care we are aiming for. Such platform is important for healthcare sector because it impact on patient engagement to their treatment, seeing patient as unique individuals as well as their families and their caregivers enhance their engagement to their own health outcomes. Trust between patient and their healthcare providers is important as patient will more likely to comply on their recommended treatment. It is also affect the financial aspect of the institution, good compliance to treatment will result to their fast recovery and decrease chances of complications which decrease the cost of their treatment. Lastly, it improve organization reputation. Easy access to social media give patient chances to see or compare reviews and rating on different healthcare organization. Word-of-mouth reviews of services of the organization impact patient impression and trust. Influence of media can give either a positive or negative impact on organization reputation that is so important to build patient trust and patient retention.