MOCPS Excellence in Safe Care Awards Earned by Four Missouri Hospitals

April 20, 2011    |   By: Calevir

Jefferson City, Missouri – April 12, 2011 — The Missouri Center for Patient Safety (MOCPS) announced the winners of its third annual Missouri Excellence in Safe Care Award program which recognizes health care provider projects that increase patient safety.  The awards were presented to the winners at the April 5 Inspiring Change…Improving Care conference in Columbia, Missouri.

This year, four special awards were presented to the following health care providers:

• Citizens Memorial Healthcare (CMH) of Bolivar, Missouri, received an award for their project ‘Tele-Health for Improved Patient Outcomes’.  Through home monitoring with CMH’s fully integrated electronic medical record system, they have shown reductions in ER and hospital admissions for home health patients and long term care (LTC) residents.  Physician appointments and conferencing via video is used in ten clinics and five LTC sites.
• Research Medical Center of Kansas City, Missouri, was recognized for their project ‘Using Just Culture in Nursing Peer Review’ for making its Just Culture philosophy operational by using project tools and algorithms for clinical and non-clinical issues.    This reduced the risk of subjectivity in patient analyses, placing focus only on the facts of each case.  The consistent use of the Just Culture tools helped increase peer reviewers’ comfort levels in evaluating cases in a fair and consistent manner while instilling confidence in the nursing staff members undergoing review.
• St. Mary’s Health Center of Jefferson City, Missouri, received an award for their project, ‘Implementing the Modified Early Warning Scoring (MEWS) System’ which increased the use of St. Mary’s Health Center’s Medical Emergency Team  (MET) through the use of the Modified Early Warning Score (MEWS) tool.  This tool identifies patients at high risk of cardiopulmonary arrest (Code Blue), and has led to a near 10% decrease in mortality rates, through early recognition and early treatment.
• ‘No Tumbling After:  A Multifaceted Approach to Falls Reduction’ was the focus of North Kansas City Hospital of Kansas City, Missouri’s award winning project.  They received the award for using a combination of multidisciplinary team recommendations and clinical staff solutions for a broad-sweeping approach to falls reduction, leading to a 40% reduction in inpatient fall rates.

MOCPS, together with a clinical and research committee, designed the criteria for rating, scoring and judging award applications from health care providers. Each provider’s program was submitted to a 9 person panel of judges comprised of physicians, nurses, risk managers and researchers. Final evaluation for a project is carried out by 3 judges.

“It’s a priority for us annually to recognize the successful safety practices in the State of Missouri,” said MOCPS assistant director, Carol Hafley.  “Beyond simply giving kudos to the winners, each has a specific opportunity to address their projects and work with those at our annual Patient Safety Conference.  This sharing is vital to inspire and encourage other health care providers to adopt similar efforts.”

More About MOCPS – www.mocps.org — The Missouri Center for Patient Safety was founded by the Missouri Hospital Association, Missouri State Medical Association and Primaris as a private, nonprofit corporation to serve as a leader to fulfill its vision of a health care environment safe for all patients, in all processes, all the time.

Video – Partnering For Safe Care

Becky Miller, Executive Director
www.centerforpatientsafety.org
Center for Patient Safety
2429 Hyde Park Road
Jefferson City, MO 65109