PI - Patient Safety Protocols

Committee Chair
Jodi Gennusa, MSN, BSN, RN

Committee Chair
Laura Harwood, BSN, RN

The Society of Trauma Nurses (STN) has established a Trauma Performance Improvement Special Interest Group (Trauma PI SIG), designed to bring together STN members who are responsible for trauma performance improvement initiatives within their institutions and/or interested in advancing trauma PI best practices.

Geriatric Protocols
Our group is working to develop a resource to help guide programs who are working to develop geriatric care guidelines or protocols. We agree that there is a lot of information available which can be overwhelming when getting started. We are working to develop a resource that will help with knowing where to begin and guide teams with examples and resources along the way.

Whole Blood
After discussion with members of our group, we agreed that while there is a lot of interest in the topic of whole blood, there are many barriers to overcome. The goal of this project is to develop an implementation guide that highlights key elements to a whole blood program and gives examples of how others across the country have overcome barriers in their own programs. Resources and a guide on the rapidly evolving evidence base will also be a part of this guide.

Jodi Gennusa is the trauma program manager at North Oaks Medical Center in Hammond, Louisiana. North Oaks Medical Center is an ACS verified Adult Level II trauma center. Jodi has served in this role for 4 years and prior to that served as the performance improvement nurse for 3 years. Overall, she has been involved with the trauma program for 10 years. After working in the surgical/trauma intensive care unit for several years, she knew her passion had quickly gravitated to caring for trauma patients in all aspects and now she is living out that passion.

Laura Harwood is the trauma program manager at St Anthony Hospital in Lakewood, Colorado, an ACS verified Level I trauma center. Her passion for trauma care stems back to the days when as a child, her mom would take her to be a mock patient for EMS trainings and mass casualty drills. She received her bachelors in nursing from the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, Beth-el School of Nursing. Her background includes time as an EMT, time served with El Paso County Search and Rescue, as a critical care nurse in Washington, at St Anthony Hospital in the neuro trauma ICU, and then serving as a nurse with Flight for Life Colorado. She has been in the trauma services department at St Anthony Hospital since 2016 and has a passion for teaching people about trauma care and collaborating with everyone throughout the spectrum of trauma care to help every patient receive the best possible care for their injuries. She is a TNCC instructor and ATCN instructor as well. Outside of her work in the trauma program, she loves to spend time outdoors backpacking, skiing, and mountain biking--and capturing all of this in her photography. She lives in Evergreen, CO with her husband and daughter.