Summary: Adventist
GlenOaks Hospital received the prestigious “Permanente Journal Service Quality
Award” for its work treating cardiac arrest patients using therapeutic hypothermia.
Susan Ford, RN, APN-CNS, CCRN, Adventist GlenOaks Hospital’s Patient Safety and
Quality Clinical Nurse Specialist, pictured at left, accepted the award on the hospital’s behalf.
Glendale Heights – Adventist
GlenOaks Hospital was recognized by its healthcare peers for improving the
quality of medicine and nursing practiced at the hospital. The prestigious 2011
“Permanente Journal Service Quality Award” was presented to a hospital representative
at the 23rd Annual National Forum on Quality Improvement in Health
Care, held in December and sponsored by the Institute for Healthcare
Improvement.
Award winners also are invited to submit their findings in a
manuscript for publication consideration in The Permanente Journal, a leading
peer-reviewed medical journal.
Adventist GlenOaks Hospital’s quality improvement project
focused on improving neurological outcomes of patients who had experienced
successful resuscitation following a cardiac arrest, but who also remained
unresponsive. A multi-disciplinary team of healthcare providers developed and
implemented a protocol based on scientific evidence and best practices from
around the country on how lowering core body temperature to between 32 and 34
degrees Celsius for 24 hours improves neurological function in those patients.
“Being able to share on an international stage the results
of the fine work our healthcare provider team is doing to help patients achieve
best outcomes is a humbling experience,” said Susan Ford, RN, APN-CNS, CCRN, Adventist
GlenOaks Hospital’s Patient Safety and Quality Clinical Nurse Specialist.
Ford accepted the award on behalf of the hospital healthcare
team at the Dec. 4-7 conference, held in Orlando, Fla. The event attracted
6,000 healthcare leaders from around the globe – and thousands more via
satellite – to meet and discuss safe, effective, cost-efficient healthcare
practices. Adventist GlenOaks Hospital’s storyboard presentation, “Improving
Outcomes: Therapeutic Hypothermia,” was among more than 500 storyboards that
were accepted; only a few were recognized by the Permanente Journal.
“It’s an honor to be selected,” Ford said, “because others
want to know about the great patient outcomes and results your team is producing.”
Both the opportunity to present the findings and to receive
such a prestigious award are tremendous accomplishments for Adventist GlenOaks
Hospital.
“We are grateful for Susan’s clinical leadership on this
project and for representing Adventist GlenOaks Hospital on an international
stage,” said MaryAnn Palermo, RN, the hospital’s Assistant Vice President,
Quality and Patient Safety.
The Institute for Healthcare Improvement is an independent
not-for profit-organization that focuses on motivating and building the will
for change, identifying and testing new models of care in partnership with both
patients and health care professionals, and ensuring the broadest possible
adoption of best practices and effective innovations.
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Adventist Midwest Health includes Adventist
Bolingbrook Hospital, Adventist
GlenOaks Hospital,
Adventist Hinsdale
Hospital and Adventist La Grange
Memorial Hospital. To
find a physician, visit www.keepingyouwell.com.
Media contact: Lisa
Parro, senior public relations specialist, Adventist Midwest Health, Lisa.parro@ahss.org; 630-856-2354