JAMESTOWN, N.D. (NewsDakota.com) – The North Dakota State Hospital Governing Body met Monday morning to conduct regular, quarterly business.

During the meeting, Superintendent Dr. Rosalie Etherington provided the latest on their anti-ligature work. Anti-ligature’s primary function is to deny anyone from using it as a means to inflict harm on themselves or others.

Dr. Etherington pointed out that the hospital was already credentialed, but the follow up was held after the written plan was accepted and work was still ongoing.

Dr. Etherington also informed the board of the consultation recently completed by Field & Associates. The consultation was motivated by two serious patient-to-staff assaults that occurred following the hospital’s triennial Joint Commission survey and related closure of its two intensive care areas.

The survey observed several strengths including the leadership adoption of a Zero Harm Initiative; staff aaring and professional attitudes; a clean and well-maintained facility; Treatment Mall environment and offsite locations for patient active treatment; previous violence reduction efforts; and an interest and openness to learning best practices to reduce violence in the workplace.

With those strengths, the consultation found areas needing improvements including: additional best practice medication algorithms for violence management, adopting defined screening triggers for safety actions, defined multidisciplinary treatment goals, and increased recruitment efforts for nursing and psychiatry.

As far as staffing, Dr. Etherington says they continue to deal with vacancies and turnover at the State Hospital.

Dr. Etherington says they’ve also looked at overtime incentive pay, mentorship education and incentive pay, social media marketing, school loan repayment and more.

Other items discussed included the QAPI plan, Medical Director’s report, and Department of Humane Services report.