Sinai Hospital Receives Get With The Guidelines-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award with Target: Stroke Honor Roll Elite Plus
Baltimore, MD, August 16 - Sinai Hospital has received the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association's "Get With The Guidelines®-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award with Target: StrokeSM Honor Roll Elite Plus." The award recognizes the hospital's commitment to providing the most appropriate stroke treatment according to nationally recognized guidelines, which are based on the latest scientific evidence.
Hospitals must achieve 85 percent or higher adherence to all Get With The Guidelines-Stroke 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 Plus, hospitals must meet quality measures developed to reduce the time between the patient's arrival at the hospital and treatment with the clot-buster tissue plasminogen activator, or tPA, the only drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat ischemic stroke. If given intravenously in the first three hours after the start of stroke symptoms, tPA has been shown to significantly reduce the effects of stroke and lessen the chance of permanent disability. Sinai Hospital earned the award by meeting specific quality achievement measures for the diagnosis and treatment of stroke patients at a set level for a designated period.
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.
"A stroke patient loses 1.9 million neurons each minute stroke treatment is delayed. The Sinai stroke-response team is committed to delivering advanced stroke treatments to patients quickly and safely," says Adrian Goldszmidt, M.D., chief of the Department of Neurology at Sinai Hospital. "Sinai Hospital continues to strive for excellence in the acute treatment of stroke patients. This recognition from the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association's Get With The Guidelines-Stroke further reinforces our team's hard work."
Sinai Hospital has also met specific scientific guidelines as a Primary Stroke Center, featuring a comprehensive system for rapid diagnosis and treatment of patients with stroke who are admitted to the emergency department.
"The American Heart Association and American Stroke Association recognize Sinai Hospital for its commitment to stroke care," says Paul Heidenreich, M.D., M.S., national chairman of the Get With The Guidelines Steering Committee and professor of medicine at Stanford University. "Research has shown there are benefits to patients who are treated at hospitals that have adopted