Patient Safety Authority Announces Winners of 10th Annual I AM Patient Safety Awards

–News Direct–

Healthcare professionals from across Pennsylvania and the nation have been honored as winners and runners-up of the 2022 I AM Patient Safety award. The contest recognizes advancements, outcomes, and commitment to patient safety.

Since its inception in 2013, the I AM Patient Safety achievement awards have honored hundreds of programs and individuals who stepped up to positively impact patient safety.

“Even amidst the pandemic, there are innumerable healthcare professionals who remain focused on speaking up, transforming the system, and making changes to improve patient outcomes,” said Patient Safety Authority executive director, Regina Hoffman. “This is an opportunity to applaud and honor those who care so deeply that they take positive action, no matter how difficult or challenging the circumstances.”

The awards are judged by a cross-section of national and regional healthcare executives; patient safety advocates; and government, university, and patient representatives. The award criteria include innovation, impact, sustainability, and scalability.

The 2022 award winners are:

• Executive Director’s Choice: HAI Focus Team at WellSpan Good Samaritan Hospital developed and implemented a plan that reduced the number of central-line–associated blood stream infections to zero for nearly a year and decreased overall hospital-acquired infections by 28%. The intervention included unit level observations, daily assessments, blood culture order sets, clinician education and real-time coaching.

• Ambulatory Surgery/Care: Jesse Hixson, MSN, Greg Purnell, MD, and the AHN-Monroeville Ambulatory Surgery Center team identified a suture problem at their facility related to healing and infections. Expanding the investigation across the hospital network and finding similar concerns, AHN converted to a different product and resolved the problem.

  • Runners-up: Bethel Park Surgery Center Team, Allegheny Health Network at Bethel Park Surgery Center; and Jamie Hallam and Front Office Staff at Spartan Health Surgicenter.

• Improving Diagnosis: Joyce Litwak, RN at Lehigh Valley Health Network discovered emergent symptoms in a patient who was admitted and treated for a hip fracture, leading to a new diagnosis of stroke, which required emergency, life-saving surgery.

• Runners-up: Dr. Jaber Monla-Hassan at Einstein Medical Center Montgomery; and Anila Gidwani, Rebecca Topping, and Bethany Dieffenderfer at WellSpan Dixon Foundation Health Center.

• Individual Impact: Kristin Keane, RN at Phoenixville Hospital creatively used FaceTime to teach a patient’s family member to provide care at home and recorded the video, which they used as a reference in emptying the patient’s surgical drains.

  • Runners-up: Theresa Lasko, RN and Deborah Gruntz, RN, Welcome Center Senior Teammates at Advanced Surgical Hospital; and Adrienne Bellino-Ailinger, RN at Einstein Medical Center Montgomery – Einstein Endoscopy Center Blue Bell.

• Long-Term Care Facility: Desiree Schuler, LPN at Hometown Nursing & Rehabilitation Center is a true safety champion, consistently providing staff education, serving as a role model for peers and championing efforts to prevent all incidents and accidents, including a 25% reduction of resident falls in the facility in 2021, despite the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • Runners-up: Alicia Elvidge, NHA, Chief Executive Officer at South Mountain Restoration Center; and Kimberly Krall of Thornwald Home.

• Nationwide Warriors: Perioperative Surgery at Northwell Health piloted remote video auditing (RVA) with non-punitive, real-time feedback to promote surgical quality improvement and patient safety in the OR. The result: a dramatic increase in acceptance and compliance with time-out surgical safety procedures and improving surgery outcomes.

  • Runners-up: The Second Victim Committee at VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System; and Rinisha Thomas, RN & Tatiana Ziegler, RN at Delaware Valley Veterans Home.

• Physician Offices: Melissa Bauman, CRNP at Lehigh Valley Physician Group Family Medicine–Bath saved a 33-year-old patient’s life when she noted a heart murmur and insisted on follow-up diagnostics. This resulted in the diagnosis of a chronic type A dissection involving the aortic root, which required an emergency chest scan and surgery.

  • Runners-up: Tammy Bowman, Office Coordinator, LVPG Hematology/Oncology Office at Lehigh Valley Physician Group; and the Outpatient Falls Prevention Team at Einstein Medical Center Montgomery.

• Safety story: Registered Nurses on 5 Cathcart/Schiedt (Medical-Surgical Unit) at Pennsylvania Hospital spoke up about a safety concern regarding dispensing of oral liquid methadone from the pharmacy to the unit, which resulted in a hospital-wide shift to storing the drug in unit-based dispensing machines.

  • Runners-up: The PAR (Patient At Risk) Bundle Team at Pennsylvania Hospital; and the Monitor Technician Department at UPMC Community Osteopathic.

• Sepsis: St Luke’s Allentown’s Emergency Department Team, Dr. Christopher Stromski and Ryan Kloss consistently achieved high sepsis bundle compliance by engaging in process improvement, reviewing opportunities, and providing timely assessment and intervention in the sepsis patient population.

  • Runners-up: WellSpan Health Sepsis Team at WellSpan Health and Dr. Jaber Monla-Hassan, Dr. Robert Czincila, Kim Mikula, Kim Vitelli, Olivia Johnson and Scott Urbinati at Einstein Medical Center Montgomery.

• Time-Outs: The Pre-Procedure Time-Out Taskforce at Pennsylvania Hospital was created in response to a troubling increase in safety events occurring prior to patients’ arrival in the OR. The team designed and implemented a process that ultimately reduced consent and wrong-site/wrong-patient safety events per day by over 87%.

  • Runners-up: Radiology Department at Chester County Hospital; and The Allegheny Health Network Perioperative Education Team at Allegheny Health Network.

• Transparency and safety in healthcare: A multi-disciplinary team at UPMC Carlisle and Central Pennsylvania Hospitals developed an order set in response to an adverse event related to continuous urinary bladder irrigation. Implemented at all hospitals in the region, the order set, nursing education and information sharing showed how transparency and collaboration can result in system improvement for patient safety.

  • Runners-up: Central Sterile Processing Department — UPMC Hamot; and Rosanna Catania-Venuto, MSN, RN — Chester County Hospital

About the Patient Safety Authority

The PSA is an independent state agency that collects and analyzes patient safety data to improve safety outcomes and help prevent patient harm. http://patientsafety.pa.gov/.

About PSA

Established under the Medical Care Availability and Reduction of Error (MCARE) Act of 2002, the PSA, an independent state agency, collects and analyzes patient safety data to improve safety outcomes and help prevent patient harm. http://patientsafety.pa.gov/

Contact Details

Bev Volpe

+1 609-230-4696

bev@madisongall.com

Company Website

http://patientsafety.pa.gov/

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