FROM STAFF REPORTS

Trinity Medical Center received the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s Get With The Guidelines-Stroke Silver Quality Achievement Award. The award recognizes the hospital’s commitment and success ensuring that stroke patients receive the most appropriate treatment according to nationally recognized, research-based guidelines based on the latest scientific evidence.

To receive the Silver Quality Achievement award, hospitals must achieve 85 percent or higher adherence to all Get With The Guidelines-Stroke achievement indicators for at least 12 consecutive months.

Get With The Guidelines is the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s hospital-based quality improvement program that provides hospitals with the latest research-based guidelines. Developed with the goal of saving lives and hastening recovery, Get With The Guidelines has touched the lives of more than 5 million patients since 2001.

These quality measures are designed to help hospital teams provide the most up-to-date, evidence-based guidelines with the goal of speeding recovery and reducing death and disability for stroke patients. They focus on appropriate use of guideline-based care for stroke patients, including aggressive use of medications such as clot-busting and anti-clotting drugs, blood thinners and cholesterol-reducing drugs, preventive action for deep vein thrombosis and smoking cessation counseling.

“With a stroke, time lost is brain lost, and this award demonstrates our commitment to ensuring patients receive care based on nationally-respected clinical guidelines,” Trinity Medical Center President and CEO Keith Granger wrote in a news release. “Trinity is dedicated to improving the quality of stroke care and the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s Get With The Guidelines-Stroke helps us achieve that goal.”

For patients, Get With The Guidelines-Stroke uses the “teachable moment,” the time soon after a patient has had a stroke when they learn how to manage their risk factors while still in the hospital and recognize the F.A.S.T (face, arms, speech and time) warning signs of a stroke.

According to the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association, stroke is the number five cause of death and leading cause of adult disability in the United States. On average, someone suffers a stroke every 40 seconds, someone dies of a stroke every four minutes and 795,000 people suffer a new or recurrent stroke each year.

Trinity Medical Center is a tertiary care hospital serving residents of Birmingham and surrounding communities. The hospital offers programs and services in all medical and surgical areas. This includes oncology, cardiology, bariatric, robotic surgery, orthopedics, neurology, women’s health, mental health, digestive diseases, geriatrics, physical medicine and rehab, sports medicine, cardiac and pulmonary rehab, and emergency care. In October 2015, Trinity Medical Center will relocate to its new home, Grandview Medical Center, on U.S. 280.