Lean Management Engineer
Education/Background:
Alisha Loy was raised in Ottumwa, Iowa. She attended Iowa State University where she received her Bachelor of Science in Psychology. She started her career at Eldora State Training School in direct care then continued her career with Family Resources, where she was a program supervisor for the locked dual diagnosis program in the Quad Cities. Alisha left the field of social services to become licensed in Finance and Asset Management and worked as an independent contractor and trainer. She was able to take leadership and sales training from teachers such as John Maxwell and Tom Hopkin; learning concepts such as servant leadership and how to fail forward.
In 2006, Alisha returned to Family Resources, where she was given the opportunity to work in quality and process improvement. Here she learned about compliance, data analysis and design of new services. In 2015 Alisha came to the University of Iowa as a Quality and Operations Improvement Coordinator in Sterile Processing. She became certified through the International Association of HealthCare Central Service Materiel Management as a Certified Registered Central Service Technician and worked on process improvement projects such as the care and cleaning of flexible endoscopes; ophthalmic Instrument processing and turnaround time for robotic instruments. Alisha represented University of Iowa on four national standards committees through the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation; where she was involved in the completion of a new national standard on Quality Management Systems and was included on the revision of ST 79: Comprehensive guide to steam sterilization and sterility assurance in health care facilities. In December, 2016 Alisha joined the Office of Operations Excellence where she has been working with a variety of departments including the Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center, Employee Health and the Burn Unit. For Alisha, the most rewarding aspect of this work is knowing “you have the opportunity to make significant improvements for the patients and families that we serve.”
Through personal and family illnesses, Alisha has become a gladiator for patient safety and Hawkeye fan. In 2010, she and her husband founded the Tripp Foundation that supports children and families dealing with chronic and acute kidney disease. Through TRIPP Foundation partnerships have been made with University of Iowa of Iowa Pediatric Nephrology & Transplant and the National Kidney Foundation (NKF). Alisha is active through the partnerships with the Comfort4Kidney Support Group and in raising awareness of childhood kidney disease by providing family fun activities for the three NKF walk events in Iowa. Charitable work along with raising a young family keeps Alisha and her husband Aaron busy outside of work. Although it has been said that in the midst of the controlled chaos, they attempt to squeeze in a batch of homebrew at least once a year.
Alisha’s favorite process improvement tool or principle is the cultural aspect of “mutual respect” where everyone’s voice, opinion is equal….you develop the process together, respectfully challenging the thinking of others to get to a better outcome….knowing everyone brings something to the table creates a holistic sense of the process allowing for overall awareness, higher quality, improved efficiency and sustainability.
Responsibilities:
- Develop and deliver material for our two day training sessions.
- Work with outpatient, inpatient, service and administrative teams to develop short and long term methods for improving patient flow and length of stay.
- Collaborate with other OE staff to identify and support any emergent process needs within UIHC.
Contact:
Office: C 51-T GH
Phone: (319) 384-9048
alisha-loy@uiowa.edu
When asked, “What inspires you?”
“My children. Children whose job it is to point out every inadequacy that we have which innately drives you and forces you to get better. They show you your faults and the need to get better; all the while providing a sense of purpose.”