Toccara Jule, BSN, MBA, CHPN has joined pharmacy benefit manager Delta Care Rx as its new National Nursing Education Director. In her role at Delta Care, Jule not only will direct Delta Care's ongoing continuing education programs and management of its online suite of clinical tools but also develop new education programs for hospice clinicians and utilize her experience in wound care to lead the implementation of a new Delta Care wound care service that will provide on-demand video consults for hospice clinicians at the patient's bedside.
As the nation's largest privately held hospice pharmacy and one of the most innovative pharmaceutical care companies supporting serious illness, palliative and hospice care providers, Delta Care has long offered an extensive program of no-cost continuing education credits to clinicians at partner organizations.
"Toccara brings a wealth of experience vital to quality care at the bedside for seriously ill and end-of-life patients," said Delta Care CEO Mary Mihalyo, PharmD, BCPS. "Her experience with quality improvement and survey issues will be an invaluable asset to Delta Care partner providers. Her extensive background in wound care brings an exciting new dimension to the support Delta Care can offer our partners. Her leadership within the hospice field will ensure our multi-faceted educational offerings remain key differentiators for Delta Care in the highly competitive pharmacy benefit management field."
The Delta Campus educational suite includes access to the leading medication database, information on medications for clinicians to share with patients and their family caregivers, algorithms for management of pain and symptoms, preferred drug list information, educational videos, webinar access/recordings, and more. It's also where nurses can obtain no-cost, paperless continuing education credits.
"As a former nurse leader at a Delta Care partner hospice, I'm inspired by the opportunity to use my personal experience as a hands-on user to continue to improve the education and clinical support Delta Care provides to nurses at the hospice patient's bedside," Jule said.
Jule also will be working with Delta Care's team of experienced hospice pharmacists and Aletha Tippett, MD, a nationally recognized wound care expert, to develop and roll out a comprehensive wound care program to support Delta Care partners in managing wounds for patients at the end of life—from wound assessment to wound management, including patient and caregiver training and proper product use. "While end-of-life wound care is often focused on the promotion of quality of life through the management of drainage, odor and pain, we should never rule out the opportunity for wound healing," Jule stated.
Jule comes to Delta Care from PeaceHealth Whatcom Hospice, Bellingham, Wash., where she served as senior quality facilitator. Much of her hospice career was spent at Hospice of the Northwest, Mount Vernon, Wash., where she was an admissions nurse, nurse case manager, referral center manager and clinical services manager. She has also worked for Community Health Accreditation Partners, Wash. D.C., as a site visitor, and at Skagit Regional Health's Mount Vernon, Wash., Wound Center as a wound nurse.
Jule received her Bachelor of Science in nursing from Washington State University, Pullman, Wash. She earned a Master of Business Administration from the University of Washington's Executive MBA Program in Seattle and is a current student of its Advanced Training in Healthcare Ethics certificate program. She is a Certified Six Sigma Green Belt (CSSGB) and she has attained certification as a Certified Professional in Healthcare Quality (CPHQ) through the National Academy for Healthcare Quality. She is a member of the American Society for Quality, National Association for Healthcare Quality and the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization. She is an active member of the MyNHPCO QAPI Steering Committee and has recently been accepted onto NHPCO's Professional Education Committee. She is also an approved End of Life Nursing Education Consortium (ELNEC) trainer in Core, Geriatrics and Pediatrics.
About Delta Care Rx
Delta Care Rx (www.deltacarerx.com) transforms and improves the hospice pharmacy sector through business transparency, innovation, extreme customer service, and the maintenance of vital community-pharmacy relationships. As a pharmacist-owned, privately held provider, Delta Care sets the industry benchmark for pharmacy benefit management, mail order pharmacy options, on-demand pharmacist services and hospice-tailored electronic prescribing. In addition, Delta Care offers electronic tools, including cutting-edge telehealth technology, to improve the quality of patient care and simplify essential workflow and ordering processes within hospice settings.
