Central Zone Quality Leaders Laura Ankcorn, Lianne Nixon and Mara Miljanovic
By Deborah Purvis & Cassandra Hanson
As Quality Leaders within the Central Zone of the Mental Health and Addictions Program (MHAP), Laura Ankcorn, Mara Miljanovic and Lianne Nixon understand how important continuous quality improvement is for effective health care delivery, and for improving health care outcomes for all clients within the program.
There are Quality Leads in each zone of MHAP who focus on helping make a difference for patients through improving safety, effectiveness, equity and helping to make the overall health care experience as people-centered as possible.
People-centered care (PCC) is an approach that guides all aspects of planning, delivering and evaluating services. It means working collaboratively with clients and families to provide care that is respectful, compassionate and culturally appropriate.
The Quality Leader role within the MHAP focuses on the program’s safety, quality and accreditation requirements to achieve the best outcomes in health care programming and service delivery, while always striving for continuous improvement.
With three Quality Leaders in the Central Zone of MHAP, each can focus on different areas that help support patient care. Ankcorn has worked in Nova Scotia Health’s MHAP for more than 15 years, with 11 in a Quality Lead role. Ankcorn, who is the provincial Quality Lead, works out of the Marshall Building at the Nova Scotia Hospital and believes “being able to work across the full continuum of care from community outpatient services to inpatient acute care, rehabilitation, crisis services and forensics is an incredible opportunity.”
Miljanovic is new to the role and based at the East Coast Forensic Hospital. She is eager to help make an impact on patient care. When she moved to Nova Scotia, Miljanovic started in IM/IT, and now has settled in Mental Health and Addictions as a Quality Leader. She sees Quality Improvement as a perfect blend of program planning, process and policy development and performance analysis and improvement, and is excited to start this new chapter of her career.
“Quality improvement is often an area and role you don’t hear much about, but it is such an important component of health care delivery,” said Miljanovic. “It is a process that always aims to systematically improve the ways health care is delivered across all programs.” Nixon, who is also new to the role, and based at the Central Nova Scotia Correctional Facility supports MHAP Provincial Correctional Health Services. “I am in a unique role where I work closely with the Provincial Correctional Facilities across Nova Scotia within a Mental Health and Addictions role,” described Nixon.
Having worked in a social work role at the East Coast Forensic Hospital for the previous 12 years, Nixon is excited about this new experience. “Accreditation Canada developed the first set of standards specific to Provincial Correctional Health Services in 2019 and it is exciting to be a part of this process as Nova Scotia will be one of the first provinces in Canada to be fully accredited under these new standards.”
“Quality aims to improve not only health care delivery but also patient and staff satisfaction, safety, and security as well as effectiveness and efficiency,” explained Miljanovic. “There is a true focus on patient-centered dimensions of care which I think is very important.”
Our Quality Leads will be supporting us in preparing for Accreditation in October 2022. If you are a Nova Scotia Health team member and looking to learn more about Quality Improvement in your area, connect with a member of your site’s Quality Improvement and Safety Team.
