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Jacqueline Thompson

M.A.S. (spring '05)

Jacqueline Thompson orchestrated a feat not easily accomplished in the health care field – the veteran nurse and administrator was able to dramatically transform and improve procedures and patient care for Sharp HealthCare’s diabetes clinics. Thompson, who oversees a staff of 32, is in charge of in-patient and outpatient care for Sharp’s eight diabetes clinics around San Diego County. She also runs Sharp’s Disease Management program.

Thompson, who was seeking direction on how to better serve her staff, physicians and patients, enrolled in UCSD Extension’s Healthcare Executive Leadership Program (HELP) in 2003. This spring, she also graduated from UCSD’s The Leadership of Healthcare Organization Master’s Degree program. Both programs are administered for the UCSD School of Medicine.” The most important thing was I could apply what I was learning to my work environment,” Thomson said about the leadership courses.

As part of her independent study, Thompson studied best practices on how Sharp could improve glycemic control in hospitalized patients with a secondary diagnosis of diabetes by 20 percent. From the skills she learned at UCSD, Thompson helped lead change, and influenced culture in Sharp’s many medical staff steering committees to receive ongoing support and approval for the project. Thompson also designed report cards, with the assistance of the clinical effectiveness team at Sharp, for all the hospital units that inform them how well they have performed, as well as developed a risk parameter process so units can identify daily patients who have blood sugar levels below a certain threshold. Thompson, who joined Sharp in 1989 as a manager of medical/surgery and diabetes services in acute care, has even changed her interview questionnaire for potential new employees. “The UCSD classes taught us about hiring the right kind of people. We have a nursing shortage and you don’t want to lose the good nurses once you hire them. It affects the bottom line of the hospital and the quality of care,” she said. “If I dig deeper and ask the right questions then I’m better able to judge overall whether they’re a good fit for my team.”

The Healthcare Leadership programs also taught Thompson how to identify the strong and weak performers in her department. “You need to know who your high performers are and who can become high performers, and focus on re-engaging them because you don’t want to lose them. You don’t want to waste your time on the poor performers.”

Thompson began her medical training in 1978 after graduating from Sir Gordon Roberts College of Nursing and Midwifery in Oxford, England. Then, she worked in England as a nurse in a trauma unit, and ultimately as the orthopedic nursing officer.  “Until I took the UCSD programs all I had was on-the-job training in my career,” she said. “I felt like this was the first in-depth training I had. The professors and speakers selected were very knowledgeable and respected in their field. They gave us information that could be applied immediately to the work place. I would highly recommend this program to all (health care) managers.”

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