- Ascension St. Joseph's Hospital, Milwaukee

Ascension SE Wisconsin Hospital - St. Joseph Campus - Milwaukee, 2025 Community Benefits

Growing and Developing Our Health Care Workforce
Hospital-Supported Initiatives

Ascension SE Wisconsin Hospital - St. Joseph Campus and Milwaukee Public Schools boost workforce opportunities for students with disabilities

Ascension SE Wisconsin Hospital - St. Joseph is demonstrating that no matter their ability level, everyone should have opportunity and access to jobs in our communities. For more than 30 years, the hospital has worked with the Milwaukee Public Schools Community Assessment Training Program.

The Community Assessment Training Program primarily helps high school students with disabilities develop workforce skills, which in turn, enables them to refine their abilities and secure job opportunities. Having participants as old as 21, the goal of the program is to give these students the experience necessary to achieve their highest level of independence by exposing them to different work environments. Some of these students are hired by Ascension Wisconsin, but many also receive job offers elsewhere.

Throughout last year at Ascension St. Joseph, students were paired with mentors and learned skills in a variety of areas including in the mom and baby unit, materials management, food services, linen services, family birth and special projects. The weekly sessions provided an opportunity to practice and demonstrate these skills in a supportive work environment.

The program also helps these students throughout the hiring process, including how to apply for a job, polishing their interview skills, while providing additional instruction, support, feedback and positive reinforcement.

“We are all on the same team. We help these participants grow as individuals so they can either be hired back into our Ascension Wisconsin community, or move on to other work environments,” said Kerry Burmeister, Director of Volunteer Services. “We’ve watched students after graduation accept paid employment opportunities. We are so proud of them.”

This past school year, 13 student participants committed more than 1,600 hours of volunteer time, working alongside Ascension Wisconsin associates.

“The students are so helpful to our departments. Our associates love having the students around. They become an integral part of the departments they serve during their internship,” Burmeister said.

Ascension Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital - Milwaukee Campus also participates in this program.

Ascension St. Joseph is Leading the Way in Postpartum Care

**A nurse at Ascension St. Joseph Hospital fits a new mom with a blood pressure cuff as part of the home monitoring program, a key initiative to reduce postpartum hypertension readmissions.**

2025 aimed at reducing hospital readmissions among new mothers experiencing postpartum preeclampsia—a potentially serious condition that can develop before or after childbirth.

A Proactive, Team-Based Approach
In response to an observed increase in postpartum readmissions related to high blood pressure, an interdisciplinary team of physicians, nurses, and clinicians launched a targeted effort to take a more proactive approach.

“Coming to the hospital to have a baby is expected—but having to return due to potentially serious complications is not,” said Courtney Pickar, perinatal clinical nurse specialist at Ascension St. Joseph.

Developing an Evidence-Based Solution
Through a comprehensive analysis and review of current literature and research, the team developed a standardized, evidence-based algorithm to guide the management of postpartum hypertension. Key components of the new approach include:

A lower threshold for initiating maintenance antihypertensive therapy
Defined blood pressure parameters to determine discharge readiness
Earlier postpartum follow-up appointments and/or home blood pressure monitoring

The algorithm was introduced to clinical teams and reinforced through education and communication efforts across both inpatient and outpatient settings.

Meaningful Results in Maternal Health
The impact has been significant. After the first six months of implementing this approach, Ascension St. Joseph Hospital achieved a greater than 50% reduction in postpartum hypertension readmissions—from a baseline rate of 3.5% to just 0.86%. Further chart reviews confirmed that remaining readmissions during this period were due to new onset postpartum pre-eclampsia after discharge, which could not have been prevented through earlier intervention.

Monitoring at Home, Supporting Moms
The home blood pressure monitoring program supplies pregnant persons and new moms diagnosed with hypertension with a free blood pressure cuff to monitor and report blood pressures from the comfort of their home without needing to schedule an additional appointment. “We want to keep our moms and babies together while in the hospital and after they leave. We accomplish that by promoting healthy outcomes for both, through a variety of initiatives,” said Pickar. ”This is an example of just one of several great initiatives at this hospital that is helping to achieve better outcomes for our moms and their babies.”

This initiative reflects the hospital’s commitment to improving maternal health outcomes through evidence-based, patient-centered care. This successful approach to reduce hospital readmissions for women postpartum, has been implemented at Ascension hospitals across the state.