Chapter 21: Key Accomplishments and Retirement Plans
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Description
Ms. Villejo begins by noting her key accomplishments. She talks about helping to shape the institution as a learning environment and integrating patients into the conversation about what that should be.
She reflects on how dramatically different today’s education materials are from those of the past. She notes that Nutrition Program as a key accomplishment.
Next, she talks about her plans for travel during her retirement. She also explains why purple boas were a decorative theme at her retirement party. In the process, she describes the pleasant working environment of the Patient Education Office.
Ms. Villejo concludes her interview with comments on working at MD Anderson.
Identifier
VillejoL_03_20150605_C21
Publication Date
6-5-2015
City
Houston, Texas
Interview Session
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES, Oral History Interview, June 05, 2015
Topics Covered
The Interview Subject's Story - View on Career and Accomplishments; Career and Accomplishments; Post Retirement Activities; MD Anderson History; Personal Background; MD Anderson History
Transcript
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Well, since we talked again about your retirement party I wanted to ask you just some questions about your reflections on this career since the 1980s here at MD Anderson. And what are you really proud of accomplishing here? What are you really glad you’ve left with this institution?
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
What I am really proud of. I’ve talked about some of the programs that we’ve developed. But I think that we have really put an imprint on this institution as far as it being a learning environment. And open to patient being a major part of that. Not as just the receiving end, but also being part of the conversation and part of their care. There are a number of things that we have worked on in the organization. We have the Learning Center. But then in the clinical areas we used to have literature racks but we’re really taking those down because nobody’s providing literature anymore. So we have our own. But then we have patient teaching rooms. And we have video on demand so that they can show videos in the exam rooms. In the inpatient areas they have the video on demand. It’s like cable TV where you just select the videos and so they can watch them there. And for example with Cancer Prevention, because they don’t have the video on demand system in the clinical areas, we’ve worked with them to load the videos that were appropriate for their patients on the computers in the exam rooms so that they can [redacted]. They say, “OK, now watch this video. And then I’m going to come back and we’ll talk about this and that, see if you have any questions.” If you walk through the institution, we have bulletin boards that have health education messages. Talk to your doctor, ask these questions, and those kind of things. And we put those up there a really long time ago. I’m surprised that the furniture police hasn’t taken those down. But we have message. I mean way back in the olden days we would try to put an easel in the front door with our posters on it daily. And of course that was probably a safety hazard. But just trying to get the messages out there. We worked for—so over a year before we got it instituted, but it was our idea to have the TV monitors with the messages about the different resources for patients and so forth. So communications had done that for staff. And so we wanted to do it for patients. And so we developed the proposals and really did a lot of the research. And then when it was approved to go live, because they had the infrastructure to get it out there, Steve had them be responsible for it. But we still work on developing those messages you see for patients and family members. We’re involved from the beginning from—we had a packet that patients got before they get here. And then one when they get here. So giving them information about what to expect, what resources were available. And a lot of that was working with different committees that had patients and families on it. What do they say? We’re overwhelmed, we don’t know what questions to ask, we don’t know what resources are available. So that drives us. We know that they’re overwhelmed. And they might get a packet of information and then that packet goes on the MD Anderson pile on the dining room table. So how can we keep reinforcing those messages as they move through the institution? I mentioned the nutrition programs. We have a number of programs in the Rotary House. I mentioned that we had a long time ago that cooking program. But we’ve had classes over there. And now staff from the Learning Center—because we have a little Learning Center over there—they have mindful meditation, advance care planning programs, they have a nutrition program, and they have laughter yoga. And so of course we’re collaborating with people throughout the institution. But some of our staff are trained in doing those kind of things. So we’re always trying to get the messages and the resources of what’s available out in front of the patients, because the thing that we really hate to hear is oh my God, I’ve been here three years, I wish I knew that service was available. And that’s what we did with the Psychosocial Council I think I mentioned. We went and did training. So I had a psychosocial group that was just focused on education. And we went for at least three years to all the different clinical inpatient areas to talk about what psychosocial resources we had. And I was really shocked and amazed as far as how people did not know all the resources that we had available. I’m talking about clinical staff. And so people come and they go to their one area and they work there. And because of what we do, we have a bigger perspective of the institution and work with so many different departments. I keep repeating that. But the collaboration of us working with myCancerConnection and all the different disciplines and UTTV and just all the resources. I mean we have a luxury of a tremendous amount of resources here in the institution. And I complain we have five health educators. But then I go to national conferences and they’re like oh, we have—
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
That’s so many. (laughter)
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Yeah. We have the gold standard for having available resources and people that can focus on this kind of work.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Wow. Well, I wanted to ask you the non-institution-related questions, but something more about you as a person. And I had to smile when I saw your retirement cake in the form of luggage. So what are you planning on doing during your retirement?
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Oh gosh. So the first thing that I’m going to do in September is we’re going to go on a tour of the Silk Road in China. So my dad’s brother was stationed in Taiwan for about eight years and he married a Chinese woman and we’re very close. A group of about six, eight family members, we went to China in about 2007 I think. We did mostly Beijing down through the east side. And so now I’m going to go with a group of her friends. So I’ll be the only one that doesn’t speak Mandarin. But they do speak English too. So I’m going to make sure that they translate things for me. Because it is a Chinese tour, not an English-speaking tour. So we’ll see how that works. I’m taking a course there on beginning Mandarin, but I don’t think I’m going to be very good by the time we go. So we’re going to go on the Silk Road. And the thing to me that is amazing about China, as you go to these places you’ve never heard of and there’s fifteen million people that live in that city, it’s just incredible. And I’ve always been fascinated with health care in China. Especially community—now I’m blanking on the name of it. But just the—say physicians for lack of a better word. I don’t know that they’re actually trained physicians. But their goal is to keep the person healthy. And with my grandparents, there was a lot of complementary and alternative ways of looking at healing and health care and body, mind, spirit kind of things. And so I’ve always been very interested in that. Of course the Silk Road, that’s just fascinating. I’ve read books about it. And one on my bucket list was to go on the Orient Express. And part of it will be on the Orient Express. And we’re going to go almost up to Russia. So it’s really up toward the middle of the country up toward the northwest.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Sounds like it’ll be a great trip.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Mm-hmm. And then we’re going to go to Taiwan, because my aunt’s father I believe worked for Chiang Kai-shek. And then they got kicked out to Taiwan. So that’s why she grew up in Taiwan. And then I told her, “Well, since we’re over there, what other countries should we go to that we haven’t been?” So we’re going to go to Japan too.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Oh, neat.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
So yes. I love to travel. Last fall I went with a friend from here, Ava Plummer. She used to work in Patient Education, then she went to law school. She’s over in Legal now. We went to this wonderful tour of Portugal and Spain. And so my first thing that I was going to do was to go on the Camino de Santiago. Have you heard of that before.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Mm-mm.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
So it’s a pilgrimage that you walk across northern Spain.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Oh wow.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
And I thought what a wonderful transition that would be. Because I love to exercise, I love to travel. And just think of the people that you would meet along the road. But I was going to do that actually in June. And luckily—and I just had so many things that I wanted to do before I left, and luckily I didn’t—I just had to let that one go. I said, “You know what, why am I pressuring myself to get all this done? And I will have a lot of time on my hands.” So that will be probably next year.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
That’s really neat. So one of the little leitmotifs in your retirement party was a purple boa or pink boa.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Oh yes. (laughter)
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
So did that have any significance?
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Yes.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
OK, tell me about that.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
So I told you my group has been great party planners. Everything is a game. We do a lot of games and parties. And I convinced Steve that it was edutainment. (laughter) You learn better when you’re having fun. And so when Steve was here he would have division parties once a year or twice a year. And the first couple of them they did karaoke. And so well, when you tell my group karaoke, then of course we had to do not only the song, but we had to do a dance number with that.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Wow.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
And so ours was—so we sang and danced to the “Material Girl” by Madonna. And so I had told Steve when we walked into the room. I said, “Steve, we have a little surprise for you. So sit in the front row.” Well, of course the first thing he did was go to the back of the room. And so we come out with our boas and paraphernalia and there’s actually a picture. I’ll send it to you.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
I’d love to have it.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
And so we sang the “Material Girl” by Madonna because we had our patient education materials. So on one side we had these like—these fan kind of things. And on one side were the patient education materials. And then there’s a line in there that goes, “But the man with the cold hard cash is always Mr. Right,” and we flipped it over and it was Steve’s picture on there. (laughter) So he was like oh gosh. And so we were in several of the—entertained several times when they did the karaoke. And then I think they got tired of us. But we loved that. And then we had to do—so and just in that theme, he wanted to have each department in his division have an overview of that department’s resources and services and what they did. So what we did was we had a Las Vegas theme. And so we had each table talk about a project or program. And they were dressed as a hotel. And I don’t know the names of the hotels in Las Vegas. But one was a French theme and they had their little hats and they were in the French thing. Then the other one was the chapel of love and they had these little like almost Holy Communion veils. And then they had their bouquets and they talked about that. So I’ll show you pictures of that too because it’s hilarious. And then the associate director at the time, Nita Pyle, the one that said that she wasn’t going to get fired, the white hair, she had this incredible feather boa construction that was about three-foot-tall off of her head. And she introduced herself as an aging dance hall girl. Or what do they call those dancing girls there in Las Vegas?
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Right. Chorus girls.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Yeah, she was an aging chorus girl. It was hilarious. I mean it was just hilarious. And then the other ones of us had these little like dealer, the blackjack dealer vests on. But everybody had a costume. And so of course there were boas involved in that too. So we just tease that every time we have a party we have to pull out our boas.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Boas, that’s pretty great. (laughter)
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
(laughter) Of course there was boas lying around the offices after all these parties. So people had them hanging up on their coatrack and so that’s—
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
The essential accessory for the patient educator. That’s pretty funny.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Yeah. Exactly. (laughter) And I’m sure that Bob Brigham and John Bingham didn’t know what was going to happen next. My girlfriend I just mentioned, Ava Plummer, she said, “I came in when you were on stage with a boa. And I thought what the heck is going on here.” (laughter) So yeah, I don’t think that’s happened before at a retirement party.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
It’s a pretty good one. Well, is there anything else you would like to add to complete your interview?
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Well, as I mentioned, it’s been an incredible career here at MD Anderson. I feel like we have really accomplished a lot with all the clinical areas and as I mentioned UTTV. All of the different support services. It’s overall an incredibly collaborative environment. So that’s I think—with it being an important part of patient care, and people really dedicated, we wouldn’t have been able to do all this if there weren’t a lot of incredibly dedicated people all around the institution. We’re here to support that. And I’m very excited that really this whole patient-centered care, patient engagement, patient experience has really been driven to the top of the priority list. Because it has been proven in the literature and research that it does improve patient outcomes. And so we’re poised to be engaged in that and that’s going to be an exciting time. I have a hard time letting go of that, but I’m ready to. Like I said, a couple years ago I couldn’t even imagine why people would want to retire. But I think you just know when the time is right. And I’ve been working very hard to make sure that we’re positioned in the best possible way. And we do have a tremendous amount of support, and I think that people—in raising the Patient Experience Department up to the level that it has been raised, and linking us in there is going to be a great place to even go on to the next level. So I’m excited for them. And I’ll still be involved in different things professionally I’m sure. But there’s just a lot of things that I’d like to do. And when you work at MD Anderson there’s not much time for much else. (laughter)
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
That’s true.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
It’s great, but it’s your life.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Yeah. Well, I want to thank you for your time.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Oh, thank you so much, it’s been really fun. I hope I’ve contributed a little bit.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
It has been fun. Oh, you have. It’s been very interesting. Very different perspective on the institution. So thank you very much.
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
Yes. Thank you. And I’m so glad—oh, go ahead and finish.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
No, I was just going to say that—is there anything else you wanted to say for the record?
Louise Villejo, MPH, MCHES:
No, no, I was just glad to hear that I could link some resources.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Absolutely. Absolutely. So let me just make a note that I am turning off the recorder at about six minutes after 12:00. END OF AUDIO FILE
Recommended Citation
Villejo, Louise and Rosolowski, Tacey A. PhD, "Chapter 21: Key Accomplishments and Retirement Plans" (2015). Interview Chapters. 1536.
https://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewchapters/1536
Conditions Governing Access
Redacted
