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Kari Johnson, OTR/L, CDP®, CADDCT®, CMDCP®, CMDCPT®, BCPA
Owner/Lead Consultant
Discharge planning, facilitating access to services, client and family education, and maximizing function while minimizing risk have been recurrent themes throughout her career. With healthcare contacts all over the globe, Kari utilizes collaboration to identify programs that can be adapted and piloted in the US. She believes that all healthcare professionals and clients in every country, regardless of background, have something to contribute. Those who know Kari can attest that once she has a vision and a plan, she is flexible in accepting change but has a high level of determination and patience to create a positive outcome.
Notable Experience & Areas of Interest
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As a Social Worker in the UK in 2003, Kari helped develop and implement an Intermediate Care Team, a governmental initiative throughout the UK. The team aimed to provide supportive hospital discharges with personal care and rehabilitation at home for six weeks or more, depending on the patient's needs. Rapid Response Services were also established to prevent hospital readmissions. Kari wrote several policies and procedures and organized community events to inform local residents of the new services. The team hired and trained nursing assistants as Rehab Support Workers who carried out personal care emphasizing rehabilitative techniques to improve function and decrease the amount of care until the patient no longer required it. Each day, a conference was held with the clients' social worker, nurse, and therapists, with the lead discipline being decided based on that person's diagnosis and needs. Some had more physical needs versus social and collaborative team interdisciplinary work was essential for the ICT success. Excellent outcomes were common, crises were avoided, increased needs were addressed, and support was provided up to 24hrs in a clients home if needed. As Kari was at the beginning of her career, the process of program development
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As an Occupational Therapist, Kari has worked in many adult settings, including skilled nursing facilities, outpatient rehabilitation, acute care and ICU, adult day centers, long-term neurological programs, and inpatient rehabilitation.
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Kari has encountered numerous types of intellectual and developmental abilities/disabilities, mental health, neurological, orthopedic, significant wounds, and complex medical conditions, including COVID-19, throughout her career, which further adds to her level of preparation to address physical and cognitive needs concurrently.
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Kari has been hired as a consultant by several organizations for content creation for marketing, program development, creation of policy and procedure manuals, booklets, brochures, infographics, and healthcare/wellness website design.
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A unique area of specialty of Kari's includes aquatic therapy for adults at all stages of dementia & Alzheimer's Disease with a focus on cognition, pain control, balance, 360-degree musculoskeletal examination to determine postural factors to guide seating system adaptations and management of contractures and joint tightness related to paratonia.
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Kari has participated in collaborative activity program development, including cognitive and physical assessments to assist in developing activity stations and recommendations for person-centered activity programming in dementia care. She is researching and focused on developing multimodal activity options for this population.
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An area of interest of Kari is pain control, as pain is one of the most significant barriers to stable health. She utilizes several modalities in this area and is developing pain programs for all settings.
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Cultural, racial, ethnic, and sexual orientation/identity awareness education and training for professionals, clients, and their families is an area Kari has extensive experience in and plans to focus on for education/program development. Care facilities are becoming more aware of diverse needs, but with the Asian population growing and the Muslim faith being the fastest-growing religion, more work needs to be done. One cannot provide clients with the best services if they don't understand their unique needs.
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Don Lubensky, BSEE, MSISE, BSN, RN
Systems Support & Development Consultant
Don Lubensky holds a BS in Electrical Engineering, a Master's Degree in Industrial Engineering, and a BSN in Nursing. He is also a Certified Dementia Practitioner. Don worked for Chrysler in Detroit when he began pursuing his Master's Degree in Industrial Engineering. Within that program he began working with the Henry Ford Hospital system in Detroit with a focus on process improvement in healthcare settings. During his time there, Don felt a nursing degree would allow him to see both sides of process improvement; the changes for staff and the impact to patients. Also, he felt a pull to help others and challenge himself in a different way. Therefore, Don brings a diverse set of skills to Karing Consulting. His ability to meticulously gather data, analyze it, and utilize technology to identify process errors and develop improvements is impressively matched by his gentle manner as he cares for his tiny patients as a Pediatric Registered Nurse. Don strives to mix his engineering experience and his nursing experience to meet the needs of one patient and employee at a time in addition to meeting the needs of the broader population. Process improvement, when done correctly, not only impacts patients positively, but also impacts professionals and facilitates the opportunity for them to do their best. Don is capable of facilitating change on the smallest and largest of scales. He is approachable to all, demonstrating equitable respect, care, and regard for all, regardless of socioeconomic status or background.
Notable Experience & Areas of Interest
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Don has led teams to bring pediatric patients home, many for the first time since birth, with tracheostomies on ventilators and other complex conditions. His role has included training parents and staff to provide the necessary care for the stability these little patients and their families so desperately need to prevent readmission.
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Redesigning the intake process at a mental health facility that ensured patients had safe access to their belongings was a project Don completed that seems minimalistic, but had a hugely positive impact on the staff and patients and was invaluable to their recovery.
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Don has presented Lean Healthcare principles and guided process improvement workshops as well as held the hand of a parent learning how to provide tracheostomy care so that their baby can come home for the first time from the hospital.
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Don participated in reducing lab wait times and errors, which positively impacted patients and professionals as well as assisted in maintaining a positive reputation for the facility.
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Article Contributions
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Zarbo R, Varney R, Alassi O, Main N, Richard S, D’Angelo R, Mahar B, Lubensky D, Kryvenko O, Ormsby A, McMahon S, Draga N, Gupta N. “Integration of Microwave Technology to Reduce Fixation and Processing Time of Robotic Prostatectomy Specimens for Whole Mount Examination.” Modern Pathology. 2011 Feb; 24(1): 1947
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D Angelo R, Zarbo R, Varney R, Torres F, Alassi O, Sharma G, Kryvenko, Lubensky D, Ormsby A, Main N, Richard S. “Enhancing Peri-Operative Tissue Specimen Safety Standardization of the Surgery-Pathology Hand-Off.”
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Burt Johnson, BS Business
Marketing & Business Consultant
Burt Johnson is more often the patient than employee at this point in his life, but he has extensive sales experience and a strong desire to use his voice to help others. He brings to Karing Consulting an ability to tell the story of what a patient experiences in our healthcare system as he sustained a brain hemorrhage in 2007, has Chronic Post Stroke Pain, complex orthopedic conditions, and Vascular Dementia. Part of the dementia training that Karing Consulting provides includes recommendations to design activities and experiences that are important and meaningful to clients. Business development is important to Burt and his services are utilized based on his level of cognition and what is meaningful to him. Tasks include speaking with clients and professionals to identify barriers they are facing and marketing our services at the same time. Burt's a talker and he wants the world to know what our consultants are capable of. He carries around our business cards in his walker, trimming the edges of some cards before handing them out as they were delivered off centered. He also assists in mailing out information to possible clients and professionals as well as having phone conversations about the benefits of utilizing Karing Consulting. The goal is to provide a valuable experience for Burt and Karing Consulting with an ongoing facilitation of the "just right" challenge, which is something that we at Karing Consulting aspire to whether it be in regards to clients, professionals, or our own staff. We need to practice what we preach! Burt is a unique individual, as anyone that has met him or heard a "Burt Story" can attest to. At which point he is unable to contribute, he will always be known as an influential force in the development of Karing Consulting, including the use of the infinity sign, or 8 ball, in the design of our logo. Playing pool with adaptations after his stroke was key to his recovery. A recovery that defied logic!!
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