Planning and assessing a cross-training initiative with multi-skilled employees.

Background: An improvement initiative begun by nurses at Parkview Episcopal Medical Center (Pueblo, Colo) to develop patient-focused care delivered by multiskilled workers followed a quality improvement methodology. Implementation of the new care delivery system on a model unit--2 South--provided the opportunity to plan, analyze data, and make changes as appropriate. Parkview's indoctrination of the teachings of W.