Transcripts For SFGTV Government Access Programming 20240714

By saying aye. Thank you, commissioners. There is no Public Comment request for that item. And if anyone does have Public Comment request, i am the person to see. Hand me the forms. Item 3 is the directors report. Good afternoon, commissioners. Grant colfax, director of health. You have your directors report in front of you. I wanted to highlight a few issue, and i think the major issue that i wanted to highlight today was, as you know, we have had major patient care incidents at laguna honda hospital, and june 18 i was joined by my yor breed and the president of the board of supervisors yee to report directly to the public and to the community about patient abuses about patient abuse issues involving 23 laguna honda residents. This misconduct does not represent who we are as the Health Department and as the San Francisco Health Network, and it will not be tolerated. Laguna honda has had a positive effect on the live of generation of san franciscans and continues to be a good place for our residents. D. P. H. Leadership has taken immediate steps to correct problems including notification of all patients and family and caregivers, wellness checks for all laguna honda residents, all staff training on preventing and reporting patient abuse, and improvements in drug dispensing and monitoring policies, separation of six Staff Members involved and changes in hospital leadership. The c. E. O. Of the hospital, the prior c. E. O. Of the hospital has resigned. We immediately notified the California Department of Public Health and San Francisco police department, and each agency is investigating. Acting c. E. O. Maggie rakowsky is in place to lead the way forward, and they present a turn around plan to the commission, mayor, and the board of supervisors by september 1. And president loyce, i know you wanted to add to the comments, so i will defer to you. We are deeply saddened by what has occurred and this misconddo not represent who we are as a health care system. We contact all the appropriate places as soon as we learned what happened. D. P. H. Leadership has taken immediate steps to correct the problem, and i am confident that with the terrible circumstance comes the opportunity to make meaningful changes and will ensure the safety of patients at laguna honda hospital and the provision of quality care going forward. There are many wonderful staff and workers at laguna honda. It is an invaluable institution that has had positive effect on the lives of generation of san franciscans. Laguna honda continues to be a good place for our residents, and we are taking steps to ensure that and then build upon its strong foundation. Thank you. I also wanted to highlight some other departmental wide issues. One is announcing our new chief Information Officer eric raffin. I think hes here. Eric joined the Health Department on july 8, and he comes from d. P. H. Most recently from San Mateo Health where he was c. I. O. As six years. Eric has many accomplishments including creating a Health Information Technology Governance program, establishing a program in project Management Office and implementing a Health Information exchange. So he is the right person at the right place at the right time for the Health Department. Prior to working in local government, eric spent nearly 17 years with the department of Veterans Affairs and several executive leadership roles including overseeing major transformations in health care and Health Care Technology for a broad and vast v. A. System. So were really excited to have eric on board. I think you will see during his tenure, his vision moving forward. We are just thrilled to have him. Please welcome eric. Welcome. U i am also really pleased to announce that the San Francisco Health Network has signed the first commercial contract, and this is with canopy health. The contract was sign july 1 and will allow ucf to access Obstetrics Services at Family Health center at San Francisco General Hospital t only 24 7 Midwife Program in San Francisco. And starting july 15, ucf canopy patients receiving care at Mount Zion Mission bay and interested in the midwife assisted delivery will be given the option to select this as their birthing hospital and place to receive outpatient obstetric care related to the delivery. This was a lot of work on behalf of the contracts and hospital team, i want to acknowledge that work and greg wagner and his team in particular in terms of putting forward this first commercial contract. So very exciting three years in the making. In terms of epic, we are only a few short weeks away from what will be one of the most pivotal moments in the history of the Health Department, the implementation of the Epic Electronic Health record, and we will see how it goes on august 3. I will say the team is working very hard. All hands on deck in terms of being ready at all levels. And we are confident i am confident that we are as prepared as we possibly can be to make august 3 launches a success and then also to emphasize to the commission and to the rest of the department, this is not just a one day, everything turns on and then were done. This is a major cultural work flow change and Information Exchange going forward. So the team and the culture of the department is ready for that. I rook forward on how that is going the next time we meet. I have some exciting news with regard to surpassing our true north goal for hypertension equity for black, africanamerican patients. Equity continuing to be a major goal of the department, youll recall, and we did exceed our True North Equity goal for the 20182019 fiscal year in the metric focussing on percentage of black africanamerican patients with hypertension whose last Blood Pressure was controlled in the past year. So from january of 2015 to june 2019, hypertension and Blood Pressure control for black africanamerican patients has improved from 53 to 67 and the disparity gap between theover all population to black africanamerican the disparity gap between the overall population compares to blackafricanamerican population is decreased from 3 to 8 . This is a significant step in reducing Health Disparities in our city, and again, proof of concept that it can be done, although we have still quite a ways to go. And finally, i just want to acknowledge the Health Department marching during sf pride. We had quite a contingent joined by the president of the Health Commission. Commissioner loyce, thank you. We marched together at the sf pride parade and had one of the largest contingents ever with almost 150 people in our group. Patients from positive health care from positive Health Program also participated in the parade as they do each year. And obviously we never miss an opportunity to educate the public on Public Health, and we passed out condoms and materials supporting access to preexposure prophalaxys to prevent h. I. V. Infection and lots of different people including the Health Department and the Public Health foundation. Within the departments, the Public Health foundation, bridge h. I. V. , and community equity, and promotion and laguna honda hospital, and vsfg. And a really exciting time that i was really pleased to see the publics reaction to the Health Department and the value they have for the department that was an inspiring event. It shows we remain deeply committed in the values of San Francisco and in the work that we do. So very exciting afternoon for marching and promoting Health Equity in San Francisco. Thank you, commissioners. Thank you, dr. Colfax. We will go to Public Comment and come back to answer other questions. We have dr. Derrick carr. Good afternoon, commissioners and director colfax. Im dr. Derrick kerr. There are several intriguing features about the recent removal of laguna hondas c. E. O. And quality director. The 23 patients reportedly abused at laguna honda were under the direct care of nurses, yet the chief nursing officer was not held accountable. Instead, the quality director, a person who does not govern clinical practice and to whom nurses do not report, was removed. What was the rationale . Now, Troy Williams t quality director for San Francisco General Hospital, is taking over laguna hondas quality management, yet on his watch, General Hospital has been cited by state inspectors for its impermissible policy on reporting patient abuse. In fact, General Hospital was threatened with a fine and the loss of payments in part for this policy that allowed underreporting of patient abuses since 2016. Lastly, the d. P. H. Compliance officer was appointed acting c. E. O. Of laguna honda. If she maintains this dual role as the compliance overseer and laguna honda c. E. O. , it could create a conflict of interest. Suppose somebody reports a violation involving laguna honda. Would ms. Rakowsky be defending against it as well as as the laguna honda c. E. O. . In short, the Compliance Office should be independent from Hospital Administration. Thank you. Thank you, dr. Kerr. Next speaker. Colon gomez. Good afternoon, commissioners. Speak into the microphone please. Good afternoon, commissioners and dr. Colfax. I am also referring to the events at laguna honda hospital that was reported to the press on june 28. I will say my concerns in brief. 23 residents were subjected to privacy violations over a period of three years, and yet today the director of privacy is in charge of laguna honda . And there is no mention that the privacy at laguna honda and direct subordinate of this director is being held accountable for the privacy violations. Secondly a quick check with state shows at least 27 reports were made by the Quality Department for alleged abuses over a period of two years. 15 of which amounted to deficiencies. Such reporting was the responsibility of the quality director and i was never concerned that there was a wall of silence here. However, this quality director has been removed and replaced by the quality director of zuckerberg. Another quick check with the head shows that zuckerberg has one deficiency in the same category as laguna honda. That deficiency is for failure to report allegations of abuse. This is the same quality director that had two negligent deaths in two consecutive months while in charge. They have a 30bed nursing skilled care facility that did not pass the annual recertification survey not once but twice. This director is now in charge of laguna honda with 769 beds. On june 28, dr. Colfax stated that the misconduct of six employees happened in just two neighborhoods at laguna honda. Such misconduct is not effort throughout the facility, yet there is no mention or everyday that any of the supervisors, manager, or the Department Head of these two neighborhoods were held accountable for the six employees and their actions. And yet the c. E. O. And quality director have been removed. If the removal of the c. E. O. And quality director Consolidation Services and i am concerned with the choices being made. And i wonder what may have breed so profoundly hurtful, offensive, and heart breaking will be equally as concerning for the decisions being made. In closing, i would like to submit to the commissioners cop piste of the notice of the two negligences and the notify of diefficiencies for failing to report abuse and the deficiencies at both properties and a brief summary of my statement. Thank you very much. Thank you, mr. Gomez. Is there further Public Comment . Hearing none, the directors report is now with the commission for comments or questions. Dr. Chow . I want to go back to the first item of the report that you actually did not verbalize, and this is in regards to the governors budget. How does the governors budget affect our budget at this point . So thank you, dr. Chow. So at this point we have not been in detailed discussions with the state given this change in terms of the budget. But were having ongoing conversations and this is basically just recently passed so how it gets implemented will be a little bit unclear to us. But i think particularly around the medical expansion that we would anticipate just as we saw with implementation of the broader a. C. A. That coverage for people who currently are either without coverage or in healthy San Francisco would transfer over to this Coverage Program in particular. And we are working on the details and conversation with the state about that. I understand since its a recent passage, and it would seem to me it would be appropriate to have that reported to the finance Committee Just to bring us up to date. We can certainly do that. Yes, absolutely. Thank you very much. Commissioners . And i guess one other comment. And i thank president loyce for the comments made on laguna honda. I do think as a member of the commission that i fully support the actions on the part of the leadership, the president , and the director himself for our actions as we must make the corrective actions needed. And im hoping that the public will be tolerant of some time in order for us to be able to make these changes. President thank you, commissioner chow. No further comments or questions from the commission, next item please. Item four is general Public Comment. I have not received any requests for this item. Just double checking. Okay. So we can move on to i a tem five, which is report back from todays community and Public Health committee meeting. Yes. Thank you. Community and Public Health meeting that met immediately before this meeting today. During the meeting we had two presentations. The first from jen from the Environmental Health branch regarding the tobacco and Smoking Program including a Retail Tobacco rules and regulations. The rules that govern the tobacco permitting process here in San Francisco and also presentation about the density of tobacco permits broken down by supervisory district and the tools that are available to retailer who is either hold or are seeking permits. We also learned about the flavored tobacco ban roll out in some of the success that the department has had in both education and outreach compliance and inspections and enforcement. And in that roll out. And seems to have been very successful and then a brief update on the ecigarette ban. We also received an update from dr. Jonathan fukes from the center for learning and innovation about developing our people locally and nationally. The focus of the presentation was on internal Workforce Development where our priority training areas are including racial humility issues, project management, and Sexual Orientation and gender identity guidelines. In addition, we had a presentation about some of the external Capacity Building assistance being offer bid the department through a grant from the c. D. C. And some of the success that has come about from their consulting, for example, in florida with very high increases in the uptake of prep, in the time that the department had been consulting with Florida Department of Public Health through the c. D. C. Grant. We also had a presentation about the summer h. I. V. Aids Research Program in which the department provides mentorship opportunities for undergraduates students in h. I. V. Aids research. And there is a great class in place right now and i believe there were 90 applications for six slots that were available. And we will be having their final presentations on, i believe, august 9. And we will have some of the commissioners participating then. Thank you, commissioner. Commissioners, questions, comments . Shall we move on . All right. I will note there is no Public Comment requests for that item. Ite