MRHC recognized for stroke treatment

Not good enough. No mention of 100% recovery results, so trying to rebrand failure as success. Doesn't even rate a participation trophy.

 

MRHC recognized for stroke treatment 

Stroke patients have the opportunity to be treated at a nationally-recognized facility in McAlester.
McAlester Regional Health Center was recognized by the American Heart Association for achieving the 2019 Get With Guideline Stroke Gold and the organization’s Stroke Elite Honor Roll for maintaining compliance for two years.
“It means our hospital is an oasis here in southeastern Oklahoma and we provide the same level of care, if not better in some ways, than large hospitals in Tulsa and Oklahoma City,” said MRHC Emergency Department Medical Director Karen Siren.
“It’s a reflection of the dedication and the work of all the team in the hospital and what we’ve done to get to this level,” said Dr. Pedro Cardich, a Southeast Clinic neurologist and medical director for McAlester in-patient rehab facility.
Tammy Barnette, stroke coordinator at MRHC, said the facility sees about 30 code-strokes per month with about 40% of those diagnosed as some kind of stroke.
Siren added that the team constantly evaluates its performance.
“We look at those quality metrics and if we see there’s a place for room for improvement, we talk about it in our monthly meetings with the whole team to see how we can make it better,” Siren said.
Siren also credited a partnership with the Regional Brain Institute and Dr. Anna Wanahita, who started the comprehensive stroke program at St. John’s Medical Center, to MRHC’s achievement.
The partnership utilizes TeleStroke, a web-based approach to treating stroke victims that staff said has been successful at MRHC. Wanahita said it allows the facility to offer 24/7 coverage and gives stroke patients direct access to a stroke specialist within minutes.
“You lose 1.9 million neurons per minute when your brain doesn’t get enough blood flow so if you’re late five minutes, 10 minutes on evaluating a stroke patient, that can mean a lot,” Wanahita said. “That can mean they cannot walk or talk for the rest of their life.”
Get With The Guidelines is a program for improving stroke care by promoting consistent adherence to the latest scientific treatment guidelines, according to the American Heart Association.
Achievement measures for the program include IV rt-PA arrive by second hour and treatment by third hour; early antithrombotics; VTE prophylaxis; antithrombotics; anticoag for AFib/Aflutter; smoking cessation; and statin prescribed at discharge.
Siren said the evaluations look at everything from how quickly a clot-busting medicine is used; to how fast treatment is recognized, identified and implemented; to how often patients’ vital signs are checked and documented; and more.
“It’s a total team-based evaluation of the treatment plan,” said Siren, who added the facility aims for treating a patient within 45 minutes.
“It’s a very complicated process, very rigorous,” Cardich said. “You have to follow everything based on time.”
The program recognizes facilities for meeting requirement over various lengths of time:
• Bronze: performance of 90 consecutive days.
• Silver: performance of 12 consecutive months.
• Gold: performance of 24 consecutive months or more.
MRHC received the silver recognition last year, when it was also listed among the top 10 hospitals in Oklahoma by U.S. News and World Report.
Siren thanked MRHC administrators for their support.
Contact Adrian O’Hanlon III at aohanlon@mcalesternews.com