Featured News - Current News - Archived News - News Categories

In photo, from left: Laurie Merletti, senior director of clinical excellence; Dr. Kenneth Halliwell, neurologist; President and CEO Judy Maness; Dr. Lloyd Brown, chief of emergency medicine; Stroke Program Coordinator Rosanne Schiavi, RN; Stroke Program Director Dr. Gregory Sambuchi, neurologist; and Dr. Baljinder Singh, neurologist.
In photo, from left: Laurie Merletti, senior director of clinical excellence; Dr. Kenneth Halliwell, neurologist; President and CEO Judy Maness; Dr. Lloyd Brown, chief of emergency medicine; Stroke Program Coordinator Rosanne Schiavi, RN; Stroke Program Director Dr. Gregory Sambuchi, neurologist; and Dr. Baljinder Singh, neurologist.

Mount St. Mary's receives Get With The Guidelines-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award with Target: Stroke Honor Roll Elite

by jmaloni

Submitted

Fri, May 15th 2015 04:55 pm

Award demonstrates Mount St. Mary's commitment to quality care for stroke patients

Mount St. Mary's Hospital, a New York state-designated stroke center, has received the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association's Get With The Guidelines-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award with Target: Stroke Honor Roll Elite. The award recognizes the hospital's commitment and success ensuring stroke patients receive the most appropriate treatment according to nationally recognized, research-based guidelines based on the latest scientific evidence.

To receive the Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award, hospitals must achieve 85 percent or higher adherence to all Get With The Guidelines-Stroke achievement indicators for two or more consecutive 12-month periods and achieve 75 percent or higher compliance with five of eight Get With The Guidelines-Stroke quality measures.

To qualify for the Target: Stroke Honor Roll Elite, hospitals must meet quality measures developed to reduce the time between the patient's arrival at the hospital and treatment with the clot-buster tissue plasminogen activator, or tPA, the only drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat ischemic stroke. If given intravenously in the first three hours after the start of stroke symptoms, tPA has been shown to significantly reduce the effects of stroke and lessen the chance of permanent disability. Mount St. Mary's has earned the award by meeting specific quality achievement measures for the diagnosis and treatment of stroke patients at a set level for a designated period.

These quality measures are designed to help hospital teams provide the most up-to-date, evidence-based guidelines with the goal of speeding recovery and reducing death and disability for stroke patients.

"With a stroke, time lost is brain lost, and this award demonstrates our commitment to ensuring patients receive care based on nationally respected clinical guidelines," said neurologist Dr. Gregory Sambuchi, head of the hospital's stroke program. "The stroke team at Mount St. Mary's has demonstrated its dedication to improving the quality of stroke care, and the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association's Get With The Guidelines-Stroke helps us achieve that goal."

For providers, Get With The Guidelines-Stroke offers quality improvement measures, discharge protocols, standing orders and other measurement tools. Providing hospitals with resources and information that make it easier to follow treatment guidelines can help save lives and ultimately reduce overall health care costs by lowering readmission rates for stroke patients.

For patients, Get With The Guidelines-Stroke uses the "teachable moment," the time soon after a patient has had a stroke, when they learn how to manage their risk factors while still in the hospital and recognize the F.A.S.T. warning signs of a stroke.

According to the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association, stroke is the No. 5 cause of death and a leading cause of adult disability in the U.S. On average, someone suffers a stroke every 40 seconds; someone dies of a stroke every four minutes; and 795,000 people suffer a new or recurrent stroke each year.

Hometown News

View All News