Saint Joseph London: Journey to Magnet Designation

Magnet Recognition Program

Taking the steps to achieve the highest recognition a hospital can receive

While Saint Joseph London celebrates its centennial this year, it is also undertaking a new journey that will enhance its nursing services into the next century of health care for the community.

The journey is what the Magnet Recognition Program calls the pathway the hospital will take to become a Magnet facility. The program, under the auspices of American Nurses Credentialing Center, is a roadmap to advance nursing excellence.

“Magnet designation is the highest level of recognition that a hospital facility can receive for its nursing services,” said Andrea Creekmore, Vice President of Patient Care Services for Saint Joseph London and Saint Joseph Berea. “Historically, over decades of research, the evidence shows that outcomes in Magnet facilities are almost always better than non-Magnets, because all of the structure is in place for good patient care.”

Documenting Care Standards

To achieve Magnet status, the London hospital will document  what it does to meet program’s standards of: 

• Fostering nursing talent, education and job satisfaction.
• Creating a collaborative workplace culture.
• Improving nursing recruitment and retention.
• Improving patient experience and outcomes.

The hospital will demonstrate it meets those objectives with documentation, both of data and anecdotal information supplied by the nursing staff—the program calls these anecdotal examples “stories.”

“There are about 80 of these types of standards that we have to tell a story about,” Creekmore said. “We have to explain how we meet that standard through storytelling and evidence. … We have to show documentation that what we are saying in these stories is true.”

Examples of stories might relate how a nurse used feedback from a patient to change the way the hospital delivers health care, or how a nurse helped determine equipment needs at the hospital. 

“There’s a lot of data we have to submit but we also have to tell stories about how nursing plays a role in the health care environment—that we’re at the table, we’re part of decision-making for how health care is delivered. And that we are shaping and refining the care environment through shared governance,” she said.

The Journey to Magnet Designation

Creekmore recruits Magnet Champions, nurses or non-nursing staff who will collect those stories from their peers on the front lines of care. Brittany Bowling, an oncology nurse navigator, born and raised in London, is one of those Champions. She came to Saint Joseph London from a Magnet hospital two years ago and is a passionate supporter of the program.

“When I heard we were starting that journey, I wanted to make sure everyone knows this is not just some designation that doesn’t matter,” she said. “Every designation is important, but this one is really not just a slogan, not just a sign that gets put up on the hospital. It truly has meaning. It’s work that matters and I am so proud we are starting this journey.”

Bowling recalls that her nursing school encouraged students to seek jobs at Magnet-recognized hospitals. Among the benefits supported by data are better patient outcomes, better safe patient/nurse ratios, greater job satisfaction and a high degree of respect for nurses.

She has been sharing about the program with other caregivers and predicts they will be excited about it: “I think it’s going to be like a generate enthusiasm”

Saint Joseph London is in the early stages of working toward the recognition, since it formally applied for the Magnet program in February. The information-gathering process is comprehensive and time-consuming — the required documentation won’t be ready to submit until February 2028. Once it is reviewed by the ANCC, its surveyors will come to London to verify it and validate that the Magnet standards have been met. A decision will follow a few months later.

Creekmore came to London in 2019 from a hospital that took many years to achieve Magnet recognition; it needed to make many improvements along its journey to meet the standards. That will not be the case for Saint Joseph London, she said.

“London is an environment that is very rich and ready for being labeled as a Magnet organization because it already has a lot of those components in place,” she said. “Because it is already performing so well, our standards are pretty high. I don’t think getting the designation will change who we are—I think it validates the service that we already provide.”

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