The hospital has been named a top institution for stroke care by the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association, and was recently awarded the Get With The Guidelines®-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award with Target: StrokeSM Honor Roll Elite. The award recognizes the hospital’s commitment to providing stroke treatment in accordance with nationally recognized, research-based guidelines.
“A stroke patient loses 1.9 million neurons each minute stroke treatment is delayed," said Linda Sugure, RN, BA, stroke coordinator at St. John’s Riverside. "This recognition further demonstrates our commitment to delivering advanced stroke treatments to patients quickly and safely.”
To receive the Get With The Guidelines accreditation, hospitals must achieve 85 percent or higher adherence to all 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. To qualify for the Target: Stroke Honor Roll Elite, hospitals must meet the measures developed to reduce the time between a patient’s arrival and treatment at a hospital.
Patients at top-ranked hospitals such as St. John's are treated with with a clot-busting tissue plasminogen activator, or tPA, which is the only drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat ischemic stroke. If given intravenously during the first three hours of a stroke, tPA has been shown to significantly reduce the effects of stroke and lessen the chance of permanent disability.
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.
“St. John’s Riverside Hospital continues to strive for excellence in the acute treatment of stroke patients. The recognition from the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s Get With The Guidelines-Stroke further reinforces our team’s hard work.”
For more information on the services offered by St. John's Riverside, click here.