Karen Reed-Gallegos

Oversaw daily operations of the long term care complaints department, ensuring smooth workflow and timely completion of tasks.

Applied strong leadership and problem-solving skills to maintain long term care team efficiency by scheduling recertification surveys as often as possible to be completed in tandem with the complaint investigations to organize the workflow.

Created a system to improve customer satisfaction with timely response to complaint findings that addressed the complainant's concerns and opened dialogue to explain long term care regulations and processes.

Increased team productivity by implementing quality assurance reviews of completed complaint investigations to ensure the complaint findings and ASPEN Complaints and Incident Tracking were thorough and entered timely.

Enhanced communication within the Nursing Facilities long term care team by participating in weekly scheduling meetings with recertification survey scheduling staff to coordinate efficiency between complaint and recertification surveys.

Conducted inspections in nursing homes to ensure regulatory compliance with recertification surveys, complaint investigations and onsite revisits.

Became a certified surveyor trainer and provided education and mentoring for new nursing and generalist surveyors related to the long term care survey process.

Utilized strong leadership skills as a team coordinator on surveys that included remaining calm during high-stress situations, communicating with other team members to ensure thorough completion of tasks, and completing the survey timely.

Communicated clearly and directly with facility staff, residents, family members, physicians, and others pertinent to the investigations.

Performed infection control inspections in long term care facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic and became proficient with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's standards of practice.

Implemented a formal education process for nurse surveyors to perform the medication administration observation and medication storage tasks during recertification surveys. New nurse surveyors continue to complete the education prior to performing the tasks on surveys.

Utilized strong clinical judgment as the registered nurse on survey teams, and maintained up-to-date knowledge on emerging trends in nursing practice and wound care. This included using first-hand knowledge and clinical expertise with medical issues, medications and prescribed treatments.

As a disease intervention specialist, investigated new sexually transmitted disease infections and conducted contact tracing of those individuals in order to identify potentially exposed partners and offer them testing. The infections included HIV, gonorrhea, syphilis and chlamydia.

Facilitated linking positive partners to clinical care for initial and ongoing medical treatment to ensure timely treatment.

Improved community health by identifying and investigating cases of communicable diseases and implementing appropriate interventions.

Ensured accurate documentation of case information in compliance with state and federal guidelines, maintaining confidentiality at all times.

Conducted contract monitoring visits to clinical providers and the Western Colorado AIDS Project, who were recipients of Ryan White funding. The funding allowed people to receive medical care for free or a discounted rate, in order to ensure their medical compliance and remained in care.