HJAR Jan/Feb 2020

HEALTHCARE JOURNAL OF ARKANSAS I  JAN / FEB 2020 61 For weekly eNews updates and to read the journal online, visit HealthcareJournalAR.com Commission reviewers evaluated compliance with hospital standards spanning several areas includ- ing emergency management, environment of care, infection prevention and control, leadership, medication management, and rights and respon- sibilities of the individual. The Joint Commission’s standards are devel- oped in consultation with healthcare experts and providers, measurement experts, and patients. They are informed by scientific literature and expert consensus to help health care organiza- tions measure, assess and improve performance. The surveyors also conducted onsite observations and interviews. “As a private accreditor, The Joint Commission surveys healthcare organizations to protect the public by identifying deficiencies in care and work- ing with those organizations to correct them as quickly and sustainably as possible,” said Mark Pelletier, RN, MS, chief operating officer, Accred- itation and Certification Operations, and chief nursing executive, The Joint Commission. “We commend Northwest Health Physicians’ Specialty Hospital for its continuous quality improvement efforts in patient safety and quality of care.” “We are pleased to receive The Gold Seal of Approval®, an internationally recognized sym- bol of quality, from The Joint Commission,” said Michael Herr, chief administrative officer of Northwest Health Physicians’ Specialty Hospi- tal. “Staff from across the organization continue to work together to develop and implement approaches that improve care for the patients in our community.” Baptist Health Celebrates 30th Anniversary of Performing Arkansas’ First Heart Transplant Nov. 10 marked 30 years since Baptist Health- Little Rock performed the first heart transplant in Arkansas. In the years since, Baptist Health has continued to provide treatment at Baptist Health Heart Failure and Transplant Institute. Baptist Health hosted a 30th anniversary lun- cheon on the Baptist Health-Little Rock campus to honor and recognize heart transplant recipients from the past three decades. Mary E. Wilson of Jacksonville received the first transplant in 1989. Wilson had suffered from severe cardiomyopathy, and her heart muscle was failing and could not pump blood efficiently. With- out the heart transplant, her prognosis for survival stood at less than a year. Since then, more than 289 heart transplants have been performed at Baptist Health. Baptist Health continued its long history of heart mile- stones in 1999 when it introduced left ventricular assist devices (LVAD) to the state and in 2017 when Arkansas’ first total artificial heart was implanted in a patient. The Baptist Health Heart Transplant Program is part of the Baptist Health Heart Failure and Trans- plant Institute. Based on the Baptist Health-Lit- tle Rock campus, the program provides a central location for patients who have had an organ trans- plant or are awaiting a transplant to be evaluated in the most timely and comfortable manner. Baptist Health offers patients extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), LVAD, total arti- ficial heart, and heart transplant. Baptist Health also actively participates in heart failure clinical trials, advancing the system’s collec- tive knowledge about beneficial therapies. Mercy Hospitals Earn A Grades Mercy Hospital Fort Smith and Mercy Hospital Northwest Arkansas in Rogers were two of nine Mercy hospitals and only 877 in the country that received A grades in The Leapfrog Group’s Fall 2019 Hospital Safety Grade. The national nonprofit patient safety advocate group assesses hospitals nationwide based on the outcomes of their efforts to prevent medi- cal errors, infections and other patient harm, and gives traditional letter grades that reflect their ability to keep their patients safe. In addition to its nine A grades, three Mercy hospitals earned B ratings, demonstrating a consistent commitment to quality and safety across the board. “I commend Mercy for having so many hospi- tals with A’s ‒ and no hospital below a B ‒ in the latest update to the Hospital Safety Grades,” said Leah Binder, Leapfrog president and CEO. “That’s exceptional performance for a health system. We congratulate the board, leadership, volunteers, clinicians and staff who put their patients first.” In addition to the Fort Smith and Northwest Arkansas hospitals, Mercy’s hospitals in the fol- lowing communities received A grades--Jef- ferson County, Joplin, Lebanon, St. Louis, and Washington in Missouri; and Ardmore and Okla- homa City in Oklahoma. These grades come on the heels of Mercy hav- ing been named a top five large U.S. health sys- tem for 2019, and Mercy Hospital Northwest Arkansas, Mercy Hospital St. Louis and Mercy Hos- pital Oklahoma City earning top 100 hospital rec- ognition from IBM Watson Health. Developed under the guidance of a national expert panel, Leapfrog uses 28 measures of pub- licly available hospital safety data to assign grades to more than 2,600 U.S. hospitals twice per year. The methodology is peer-reviewed and fully trans- parent, and the results are free to the public. Mercy Hospital Fort Smith President Ryan Geh- rig said he’s proud of the hospital’s A grades going back to 2016. “The Mercy Hospital team continues to dem- onstrate an ability to improve performance and achieve excellence across multiple departments. I’m blessed to work alongside so many dedi- cated and caring people who have a passion to get health care right,” he said. Likewise, Mercy Hospital President Eric Pianalto said it takes a special team to achieve high safety grades year after year. “Patient safety has always been a priority for Mercy caregivers and this latest acknowledge- ment confirms our team is meeting our mission of exceptional service and compassionate care in the spirit of the Sisters of Mercy,” Pianalto said. Arkansas Children’s Research Institute Joins NIH- Funded Research Network Addressing Eosinophilic Gastrointestinal Diseases Children with rare inflammatory diseases that prevent them from eating many foods will have the backing of an NIH-funded research network on their side, as Arkansas Children’s Research Insti- tute (ACRI) joins a $7.75 million clinical research project addressing eosinophilic gastrointestinal diseases (EGIDs). Dr. Robbie Pesek, an assistant professor of allergy and immunology at the University of Arkan- sas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) College of Medi- cine who practices at Arkansas Children’s Hospital (ACH) and specializes in EGIDs, will serve as the site investigator of the Consortium of Eosinophilic