Submitted
PLAINVILLE — Four Rooks County health care professionals were invited to address the Kanas Healthcare Collaborative’s eighth annual Summit on Quality on May 6 in Wichita.
Rooks County Healthcare Center nurses Erin Stahl, Michele Hinger, Pam Harmon and Stockton EMS director Julie Cole delivered a presentation on early recognition and treatment of heart attacks and strokes.
The presentation focused on how RCH staff and county EMS personnel advance their performance improvement efforts concerning ST-elevation myocardial infarctions (STEMI heart attacks) and stroke care. They also shared their on-going focus on measurement, including review of their quarterly Kansas Heart and Stroke Collaborative (KHSC) quality reports through standing committee meetings.
“Kudos go out for the teamwork of all the providers and staff, who all work together to make this happen. We hold some state records on our quick and efficient treatment of our patients for stroke, STEMI and trauma. Other hospitals across the state are watching us and wanting to know how we are succeeding. It was quite an honor to be selected to present at the summit. As always, we are so proud of the commitment of RCH to raise the bar and continue to improve the care we provide,” said Harmon.
The establishment of a monthly meeting between RCH staff and county EMS personnel has led to significant improvements in timeliness of care. For example, a recent patient was identified in the field as having suffered a heart attack, transported to RCH emergency room where the patient was stabilized in 11 minutes, well below the KHSC protocols. With timely transport and coordination with the cardiologists, total time from arrival to RCH’s emergency room to the cardiac catheter lab at Hays Medical Center was under one hour.
Dr. Bob Moser, Executive Director of KHC said with regards to the work RCH is doing, “It was a good overview of how a critical access hospital adapted evidenced based guidelines to their local realities. It shows the value of performance improvement using time dependent measures in managing a time critical diagnosis.”
According to Harmon, the combined commitment of RCH administration, leadership and staff along with the county EMS staff all aid in improving the rapid identification, initial procedures, transport and proper interventions for STEMI and stroke patients.