Founded in 2017, The Ohio State University Innovation Studio is run by the OSU College of Nursing and Center for Healthcare Innovation and Wellness. In normal times, the Innovation Studio travels the country, encouraging students to create healthcare solutions, and helping them to use technology to develop their ideas into marketable new products.
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How has the pandemic affected the innovation program? DailyNurse spoke to Tim Raderstorf, MSN, RN, the co-founder of the Innovation Studio and Chief Innovation Officer (as well as Clinical Instructor of Practice) at the OSU School of Nursing. Dr. Raderstorf has conducted neurosurgical research on Tethered Spinal Cord Syndrome, but his passion is healthcare innovation.
Before the pandemic, when he wasn’t teaching, Raderstorf traveled the country with OSU’s mobile Innovation Studio. He is also an expert on the role of innovation in nurse leadership and is now an award-winning textbook author. Evidence-Based Leadership, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship in Nursing and Healthcare, the textbook Raderstorf co-wrote with OSU School of Nursing Dean Bernadette Melnyk was an American Journal of Nursing (AJN) Book of the Year, winning first place honors in its category. (In Part Two, he discusses the book and explains why he found the judge’s comments particularly gratifying).
DailyNurse: How have things changed for the Studio during the pandemic?
Tim Raderstorf: “We used to do to makerspaces that would travel. And, you know, it acted as this hub of interaction and engagement and excitement. But when COVID hit, people didn’t want those things [the makerspaces] in their lobbies… and we didn’t want 15 people hanging out in the same location. So, we shut down the traveling innovation studio, which was our original one, and [now we] just run our permanent location, which is right in central campus.”
DN: What did you do when the pandemic hit?
TR: “For the first six months of COVID, because we didn’t open our doors until the students came on campus in September, we ran a virtual makerspace. So Josh Wooten, our shop manager, particularly at the beginning, used our laser cutter and CNC router to make PPE, with our College of Engineering and a variety of public-private partnerships, to get our clinicians the safety equipment they needed to be able to save our communities. We wanted to keep Josh as safe as we possibly could, so we set up a makerspace in his house. He had five 3D printers in his home, and he was printing PPE around the clock with mostly faceshield frames, so that we could hook transparencies or plastic to them. It’d be running day and night, doing work for us while we slept.”
DN: Were the students able to participate at all last year?
TR: “Well, in May [2020], we launched a COVID [Campus Safety] challenge, encouraging everyone to submit their ideas to us virtually. And when students came back to campus, we ran a second virtual challenge asking for ideas that would impact their safety on campus. Things like how to improve mask adherence, social distancing, and the mental health of our student population. We also had pitch days in October and December.
In fact, at that December pitch day, one of the nurses on the unit [came by on her] 15-minute break to pitch her idea to us. And she was wearing PPE, and—unknown to her—it was PPE that we had printed for her.”
DN: Has the pandemic been inspiring nurses to innovate?
TR: “I feel that during the pandemic, some of the acclaim and attention and interest has prompted more nurses to raise their voices in terms of public health and policy, but also to innovate and come up with solutions for the various pain points that you’ve encountered during the pandemic. And I think that’s going to build. I’m very bullish on that. I’m big on systems of innovation and building a structure of innovation, to have a proper culture of innovation that thrives.
Dr. Tim Raderstorf demonstrates an innovation exercise at the Academy of Nurse Leaders.
I’d argue there probably still isn’t much structure for nurses, physicians, pharmacists, whoever is at the frontlines to bring their ideas for [innovations] to most organizations. I do think clinicians have never been more willing and engaged in changing the system. The question is, can systems become engaged and willing and set their clinicians up for success so that they can appropriately drive the changes that need to occur? Particularly as we become cash strapped and healthcare is going through a massive transformation.
I think it there’s going to be a very challenging component to the future of healthcare once the pandemic is over. We have to decide what we refuse to go back to and what we will continue to make changes on.”
DN: Who comes to the pitch days? Students? Faculty?
TR: “We’ve had over 1000 people pitch to us over the last three years. It’s about 55 to 60% students and about 40 to 45% faculty and staff, which is a nice healthy mix, and it’s trending much more towards the students. We are seeing an increase in faculty and staff, but the students are increasing at a much faster rate.”
DN: Are nurses pitching ideas?
TR: “You know, one of my least favorite terms is ‘nursing innovation’. Because there’s no such thing as physician innovation, there’s no such thing as dentist innovation, there’s no such thing as pharmacist innovation. So why do we label ourselves other than just being innovators and really showcasing that we are indeed equals with our peers?
We knew that in order to raise the awareness of the amazing things that nurses do, and create and innovate and invent, that we need to do this alongside our peers, and, you know, almost be humble bragging, as we go along, and said, ‘hey, look, what we’ve created, why don’t you come over here and create something great with us too’.”
DN: When you describe the Studio as “interprofessional,” can you elaborate a bit?
TR: “We encourage people to engage with other individuals who have different backgrounds and professional expertise; [in fact] we require it. If you don’t have an interprofessional team, that is one of the things that disqualify you from being eligible for funding. So if two physicians come up with a great idea, we say, ‘awesome, who are you going to use this on’? And they usually say, ‘well, it’d be an operating room or height’. ‘So who preps your trays? Well, that person needs to be on your team, or you need to be getting insights from the people who are going to be interacting with this tool as well.’”
DN: Are the people who pitch to you mainly aspiring entrepreneurs looking to develop a product that they can sell?
TR: “It’s probably about half and half. A lot of people are interested in developing a new business, a new tool, something along those lines. But [we] also see a lot of people interested in policy change and awareness campaigns. Our most successful commercial effort was a method for preventing addicts from injecting drugs into their system through their IVs at the hospital. We really want to be able to help these people while they’re under our care and give them the resources they need to continue to be successful. So this nurse in the team wanted to find a way to stop people from being able to access the lines without us knowing about it and created a tape that would go over IV ports.
And, you know, it’s now on the market. Her idea has gone from something she drew on a napkin to a tool that is now being used worldwide to help patients.
[The entrepreneurial aspect helps spur change because] there’s nothing that’s free in our health system. That makes it really challenging to scale your ideas without going the commercialization route. If you can’t sell it, it’s really hard to have that mass impact. But really, the key goal of innovation studio is to build a culture of innovation at Ohio State. We really believe that the true impact is in getting our students, faculty, and staff together and creating an atmosphere where great things can happen.
That’s a long game, you have to you have to be patient, and you have to be willing to continue to water the seeds until they’re able to until they’re able to sprout.”
Adopt a Nurse Ohio won’t provide you with an extra mom or dad, but it might connect you with a supportive virtual fairy god-parent. Frontline nurse Sydney Garringer lost her stethoscope and all of her Covid gear when someone broke into her car. Less than 10 hours later, a member of the Adopt a Nurse – Ohio Facebook group, asks, “Sydney, what your favorite color?” —and Sydney replies that most of her stolen equipment has already been replaced. The next morning, another member cheerfully complains, “I never got a chance to choose anything, your [Amazon Wish] list is empty now, are you sure you don’t need anything else?” The 1.9 thousand members of AAN Ohio are ready and waiting to ease the load of the state’s nurses and bring them good cheer.
Patient Care Technician Heather Marie has been treating a growing number of Covid patients, but she’s determinedly positive: “I am continuing my medical dream and going to school to become a paramedic! …. I love what I do and I love knowing I am making a difference in my patient’s life! I work with some of the most wonderful nurses, techs, doctors, respiratory staff, therapists, housekeepers, and dietary staff. That’s one thing that keeps me sane during this time is the teamwork we have!” A group member fancies the dinosaur motif of the scrub hat Heather wears in the photo she posted. Another member sends her a pair of socks festooned with images of little medical clipboards, bandages, and nurse-related images.
April Higgenbotham—who has been an RN for 21 years—posted on the site less than a week before coming down with Covid. A member’s “goodie bag” arrived just in time to raise her spirits while she sat home in isolation from her family.
ICU nurse Brendan McQuown posts a heartfelt pean to his wife: “I am active duty and work in a COVID ICU… My wife of 12 years has been a nurse for 10 years. My hero is my wife. She works, takes care of our basketball team of kids, holds the fort down when I deploy, and still managed to put herself through a MSN program… I don’t know how she does it all.”
And a female RN paid tribute to her ICU nurse spouse: “My name is Paige and I’m an RN, but this post is for my husband Ryan. He is an ICU nurse working in a Covid unit. He would never ask for anything from anyone so that is why I am posting for him! It’s love, I know. What better way than to surprise him to say thank you?! He has been a nurse for 10 years… Recently he was working as a float ICU nurse going to 5 hospitals some over an hour away from home to work in the Covid units. He just started working as a traveler nurse taking assignments in Covid ICUs. He is the hardest worker that I know and is so deserving of receiving special gifts! He works 4-6 days a week, night shift, 12 hour shifts, to provide for our family. We have 2 kids under the age of 2! He never complains and comes home with a smile on his face to greet me and our two boys! Thank you taking the time to read this and thank you for doing this!”
The Adopt A Nurse Ohio group was founded by Heather Stewart, an event coordinator. “I have coordinated everything from weddings, birthdays, funerals, graduations, festivals, etc,” she says.
Adopt a Nurse Ohio is not Heather’s first time up at the Adopt-a rodeo; she has quite a track record! “When Covid [first] hit,” she recalls, “It was our high school seniors who were taking the first blow of missing out on traditions and memories, so I created Adopt a Senior… This was a huge success: we are a small village, but [we were] able to adopt every senior.” Later, when schools started back in session Heather said that she “Noticed a lot of teachers were straining for more supplies, disinfected wipes, masks, etc. So, I then created Adopt a Teacher, I went a little bigger and did this on the county level. Clark County School districts and all teachers/aides/faculty in those schools. This too was a huge success. Hundreds of teachers were adopted.”
Adopt A Nurse Ohio co-founder Heather Stewart taking a break with a friend.
But Heather also has a lot of nurses in her family, including her mother, step mother, brother, and sister in law, “along with a slew of aunts and uncles.” Before long, she felt compelled to do something for nurses too. “Now here we are and our nurses are being hit hard on the frontlines. They are fighting a fight none of us could imagine, or would want to. I went even bigger than local district and county, and went with the state of Ohio. All of our nurses need us. We are all in this together,” Stewart said.
What about the long run? “I do plan on keeping this group going through the pandemic, and after, as long as there is a want for it” says Heather. “All nurses deserve a random act of kindness, regardless of the pandemic.”
Click on OhioNurse for more on nurses and nursing in Ohio!
Since the pandemic hit her area, Nurse of the Week Sanya Davis has been employed at a COVID-19 drive-through testing site in Marion, Ohio. Testing people for the virus can be stressful, but she has found a rewarding pursuit during her off-time. In March, Davis decided it was a good time to bring a bit of “sunshine” into peoples’ lives. For six months now, she has been delivering special, personally-assembled—and predominantly yellow-hued—gift baskets to essential workers and people in her community who “may be having a bad day and just need some cheering up.”
Davis’ Sunshine Baskets ready for delivery
How does she deliver “sunshine?” The predominant color of most of the gift baskets is a cheerful yellow. Davis reasons that “Yellow is more of a sunshine, so it brightens somebody’s day.” It started as a personal project, but the delighted responses to her gift baskets inspired Davis to form a Facebook group, “You’ve Been Sunshined,” for suggesting nominees and showcasing the baskets, and she now has an additional group, “Sunshine Helpers,” for family, co-workers, and other volunteer helpers.
Sunshine baskets have been delivered to local firefighters, a little girl who had just been diagnosed with diabetes, and a neighbor who had lost all of her teeth. Anyone who could use a little extra light in their life is a candidate. The project itelf adds light to Davis’ life, and is a logical extension of her mission as a nurse: “Everybody that helps me gets so much out of it, and it makes my heart so happy,” she says.
Upcoming Sunshine recipients include the Marion police department and the local post office. Davis doesn’t hesitate when asked about her motivation: “I feel like God has put this in my heart to do this, to help others. I’m a nurse, so I’m geared to wanting to help others. I think we hear more negativity than positivity in this town, so I figured this would be a good way to bring sunshine to everyone.”
See the Marion Star for the full story on Sanya Davis.
As colleges and universities around the country struggle with burgeoning outbreaks of COVID-19, students at Ohio State University are trying to find ways to make campus life safer. The Safe and Healthy Campus Innovation Challenge, hosted by OSU’s College of Nursing Center for Healthcare Innovation and Wellness and the Offices of the Chief Wellness Officer and Student Life is accepting student submissions from August 24 through September 7.
The Innovation Challenge is focusing on three key areas:
Physical distancing (on- and off-campus student housing, bars/restaurants, etc.)
Wearing of face masks/coverings
Mental health and well-being
Student innovators are being encouraged to form cross-disciplinary teams to pitch ideas that can be implemented in the OSU community. Winning pitches will receive financial backing and be paired with a faculty or staff mentor. First and Second place projects will be announced on September 21.
College of Nursing Dean and Chief Wellness Officer Bernadette Melnyk commented, “There is a tremendous spirit of innovation at Ohio State, and we know our awesome and creative students can identify new ideas and solutions… that will promote optimal health and well-being for the whole university. They will help us foster the safest and healthiest campus community possible.”
Tim Raderstorf, chief innovation officer for the College of Nursing and co-editor with Dr. Melnyk of Evidence-Based Leadership, Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Nursing and Healthcare, thinks students will prove to be natural innovators: “Administrators and leaders are not usually the best people to solve the problem. The best people to solve problems are the people who experience them firsthand. There’s no better group for us to be reaching out to than students because they know the problems intimately and know what solutions may be feasible for them.”
As the founder of OSU’s Innovation Studio, Raderstorf is speaking from experience. He advised student innovators that “We’re not asking everyone to come to us with a life-altering, game-changing idea. What we’re asking for is the best idea that you have right now. We’re going to try everything within our power to help your ideas rise to the top.”
Ohio printer Walter Ruiz could not quite recognize her features under all of her PPE, but the voice of Nurse of the Week Lisa Lane quickly became familiar to him during his struggle with COVID-19.
Hospitalized with COVID after passing out at his business, Ruiz was “scared; really, really scared,” and being cut off from his family left him feeling terribly alone: “When you don’t have anybody around you…no members of your family…it’s really hard.” Fortunately, Lane, an RN on the COVID unit at Cincinnati’s Mercy-Fairfield Hospital supported him at his bedside. She held his hand, offered him constant words of encouragement and hope, and urged Ruiz to keep fighting the virus so he could once again see his grandchildren. She told me, “You can make it; you can do it,” Ruiz recalled.
After his recovery, a grateful Ruiz was determined to thank the nurse who had kept his spirits up during his ordeal, but the disguising effects of PPE made it hard for him to identify her. With help from the hospital, he intently perused photos of the unit nurses and finally made a tentative choice. Ruiz’s uncertainties immediately fell away, though, when he once again heard Lane’s voice. To share his gratitude with all of the nurses on the Mercy-Fairfield COVID unit, when Ruiz was well enough to return to his printing business, he created a large sign reading, “THANKS to all Mercy Staff for Being Everyday Heroes in Our Lives.”
Lane was delighted to meet with such enthusiastic appreciation, but remarked, “I don’t do anything more than any nurse on the planet does…that’s just what we do.”
His run-in with the novel coronavirus was a harrowing experience, and the memory of his 24 days in treatment is foggy, but Clevelander Larry Davis remembered his nurses well enough to return after his recovery—with a gift of 15 pounds of chocolate.
As soon as he was on his feet again, Davis reappeared at University Hospital Portage Medical Center bearing large shopping bags of mood-enhancing treats for his caregivers, including Jill Dickey, his ICU nurse, and Trezla Nunemaker, his step down unit nurse. After distributing numerous boxes and canisters of sweets, a grateful Davis said, “I have pledged to the people here at this hospital that I would not squander the opportunity that they have given me to continue living and do good stuff for as many people as I can and I’m starting with that today.” Julia Skarbinski, the chief nursing officer, commented, “He was here a very long time and developed so many bonds with the nurses, and I think it’s such a treasure to see somebody walk out of the hospital and then come back to thank you.”
Like many COVID survivors, Davis can recall little of his time in the ICU: “I never knew that I had a tube down my throat. I never knew that I had a nasogastric tube feeding me. I was unaware that they were fighting for my life.” His nurses know that such forgetfulness is a blessing, as such invasive procedures can lead to PTSD. RN Jill Dickey reflected, “Thank goodness he doesn’t remember anything.”
Davis said his chocolate delivery is just a sampling of his gratitude, and he is looking for other ways in which he can show his appreciation for nurses and their families. For now, as the US death toll continues its passage beyond the 100,000 milestone, he is urging the importance of remaining vigilant: “Continue with these precautions as much as you can—I know they’re getting old—masks, social distancing, and so on. [Otherwise] You’ll have this disease before you know… your life will be threatened or worse—it will be taken from you.”
A Cleveland19 News interview with Davis and his nurses is available here.
