Corpus Christi Medical Center Receives American Heart Association’s Stroke Gold Plus Award

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas - May 31, 2013 - PRLog -- Corpus Christi Medical Center (http://ccmedicalcenter.com/) has received the Get With The Guidelines® – Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award from the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association. The award recognizes Corpus Christi Medical Center’s commitment and success in implementing a higher standard of care by ensuring that stroke patients receive treatment according to nationally accepted guidelines.  

The American Heart Association and the American Stroke Association’s Guidelines program is a tool to assess and monitor care for stroke, heart failure, in-hospital resuscitation, heart attack and atrial fibrillation.  The quick and efficient use of guideline procedures can improve the quality of care for stroke patients and may reduce disability and save lives.

“Corpus Christi Medical Center has a dedicated stroke team of nurses and physicians that are trained in rapid diagnosis and treatment of stroke victims,” said Kathy Rubano, Chief Nursing Officer at Corpus Christi Medical Center. “It is our goal to help decrease the profound effects of disability suffered by stroke patients. The key to better patient outcomes is the rapid recognition of a pending stroke, rapid transport to a Corpus Christi Medical Center Primary Stroke Center and rapid diagnosis and treatment.”

“Recent studies show that patients treated in hospitals participating in the American Heart Association’s Get With The Guidelines-Stroke program receive a higher quality of care and may experience better outcomes,” said Lee H. Schwamm, M.D., chair of the Get With The Guidelines National Steering Committee and director of the TeleStroke and Acute Stroke Services at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, Mass. “The Corpus Christi Medical Center team is to be commended for their commitment to improving the care of their patients.”

Following Get With The Guidelines® - Stroke treatment guidelines, patients are started on aggressive risk-reduction therapies including the use of medications such as tPA, antithrombotics and anticoagulation therapy, along with cholesterol reducing drugs and smoking cessation counseling. These are all aimed at reducing death and disability and improving the lives of stroke patients. Hospitals must adhere to these measures at a set level for a designated period of time to be eligible for the achievement awards.

“Corpus Christi Medical Center is dedicated to making our care for stroke patients among the best in the country. The American Heart Association’s Get With The Guidelines–Stroke program helps us to accomplish this goal,” said Jay Woodall, Chief Executive Officer. “This recognition demonstrates that we are on the right track and we’re very proud of our team.”

According to the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association, stroke is one of the leading causes of death and serious, long-term 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.