Momentum - Business to Business Online Magazine November 2017 | Page 33
Houston Methodist St. John Hospital receives
Get With The Guidelines-Stroke Silver Plus
Quality Achievement Award with Target: Stroke
Honor Roll Elite Plus
American Heart Association Award recognizes Houston
Methodist St. John’s commitment to quality stroke care
Houston Methodist St. John Hospital has received the
American Heart Association/American Stroke
Association’s Get With The Guidelines®-Stroke Silver Plus
Quality Achievement Award with Target: Stroke Honor
RollSM Elite Plus. The award recognizes the hospital’s
commitment and success ensuring that stroke patients
receive the most appropriate treatment according to
nationally recognized, evidenced-based guidelines.
To receive the Silver Plus Quality Achievement Award,
hospitals must achieve 85 percent or higher adherence to
all Get With The Guidelines-Stroke achievement
indicators for at least 12 consecutive months and during
the same period 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 Plus,
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. Houston Methodist St.
John 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 follow the most up-to-date, evidence-based
guidelines with the goal of speeding recovery and
reducing death and disability for stroke patients.
“A stroke patient loses 1.9 million neurons each minute
stroke treatment is delayed. This recognition further
demonstrates our commitment to delivering advanced
stroke treatments to patients quickly and safely,” said Dr.
Nadim Islam, Director of Emergency Medicine at St. John.
“Houston Methodist St. John continues to strive for
excellence in the acute treatment of stroke patients. The
recognition from the American Heart Association/
American Stroke Association’s Get With The Guidelines-
Stroke further reinforces our team’s hard work.”
“The American Heart Association and American Stroke
Association recognize Houston Methodist St. John for its
commitment to stroke care,” said Paul Heidenreich, M.D.,
M.S., national chairman of the Get With The Guidelines
Steering Committee and Professor of Medicine at
Stanford University. “Research has shown there are
benefits to patients who are treated at hospitals that have
adopted the Get With The Guidelines program.”
Get With The Guidelines®-S puts the expertise of the
American Heart Association and American Stroke
Association to work for hospitals nationwide, helping
hospital care teams ensure the care provided to patients
is aligned with the latest research-based guidelines.
Developed with the goal to save lives and improve
recovery time, Get With The Guidelines®-S has impacted
more than 3 million patients since 2003.
As a nurse and former stroke coordinator, Teri Ackerson is
aware that every second counts when a stroke strikes. In
May 2013, the training she used to help others helped
save her own life. Ackerson’s left arm suddenly went
numb, she felt the left side of her face droop and she was
unable to speak. Despite her symptoms, Ackerson
remained calm, made note of the timing of her symptoms
and, with the help of her son, proceeded to get treatment
quickly.
“Hospitals that follow AHA/ASA recommended guidelines
not only know the importance to treat quickly with tPA,
but they also follow evidence-based research that helps
to determine why you had a stroke in the first place and
report these findings,” said Ackerson, 46, who completed
a marathon 26 days after her stroke. “Without the
treatment I received, I would not have recovered as well
as I did.”
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 United States. On
average, someone in the U.S. suffers a stroke every 40
seconds, someone dies of a stroke every four minutes,
and nearly 800,000 people suffer a new or recurrent
stroke each year.