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J U N E 2 0 1 6 O R E X C E L L E N C E . C O M 1 5 who takes an extra 1 ⁄2 second to go over his checklist before he performs a surgery, to the teenager who looks away from the road for a 1 ⁄2 second because he wants to look at a text while driving. We can't underestimate how important those actions are and the number of people they can impact. • The strength to go on. The day after the acci- dent, I realized that my son, my daughter and Josh — who was still alive — were going to need a dad to take care of them. If I chose to be bitter, it would not only rob them of the dad they needed, it would also rob me of the opportunity to move for- ward and to heal. The vice president of risk man- agement at the hospital was the first to see the opportunity for something good to come out of this. I had no idea that speaking about it would turn out to be any- thing more than that one event. I was just going to go share some thoughts, then go home and move on. • The perspective. I talk about what I call 7 perspectives from my side of the bed — things my family learned as I reflected back on the situation and what happened with my son. I touch on everything from reminding healthcare work- ers that when somebody comes into the hospital it's a foreign world to them, to developing cultures of safety, to speaking a language people can understand. We've also got to remember that families want to be involved with their family members and their care. They want to be included in conversations. • Training needed. People frequently ask me if there's something I can rec- ommend that would help doctors and nurses have these kinds of conversations, because they're just not trained in how to do it. I sympathize with that. As a pas- tor, I'm taught how to handle families in crisis and marriages that are in trouble, • IN AN INSTANT This is the last family photo of the Barrons before a car accident took the life of Ridley Barron's wife, Sarah, and seriously injured his younger son, Josh, in his mother's arm.