Holy Name Press Releases

Holy Name Medical Center receives Get With The Guidelines-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award with Target: Stroke Honor Roll Elite

American Heart Association recognizes Holy Name's commitment to quality stroke care

May 18, 2016

Holy Name Medical Center has received the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association's Get With The Guidelines®-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award with Target: Stroke^SM Honor Roll Elite. The award recognizes the hospital's commitment to providing the most appropriate stroke treatment according to nationally recognized, research-based guidelines based on the latest scientific evidence.

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 receive the Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award.

"Holy Name is a top performer when it comes to caring for patients with serious and life-threatening conditions," says Michael Maron, President & CEO, Holy Name Medical Center. "Our stroke care program encompasses diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation, and these services have been acknowledged best-in-class by respected bench-marking and specialty organizations including, The Joint Commission, the Women's Choice Awards as well as the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association. These distinctions further demonstrate our commitment to delivering the highest level of care for our stroke patients."

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. Holy Name 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.

"The Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award has given Holy Name the opportunity to highlight the exceptional stroke care we provide our community," said Sheryl Slonim, DNP, RN-BC, NEA-BC, APN-C, Executive Vice President, Patient Care Services and Chief Nursing Officer, Holy Name Medical Center. "We are thoroughly committed to providing our patients with the highest quality stroke care, as based on current scientific research, to ensure continued improvement in treatment."

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.

"The American Heart Association and American Stroke Association recognize Holy Name Medical Center 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. 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.