• Maintaining fiscal responsibility to ensure institutional and program viability and durability

• Creating opportunities for professionals in the community to enhance the educational experiences of our learners by participating in the academic process

• Recruiting excellent learners whose talent, ambition, hard work and compassion, strengthens the overall mission and vision of MHP as a major academic organization

As part of its commitment to excellence in graduate medical education, MHP will be recognized for:
• Improving the health of the community we serve

• Fostering a corporate and institutional environment that is encouraging and conducive to learning, patient safety and quality care

• A strong commitment to both allopathic and osteopathic disciplines

• Encouraging use of innovative methodologies and research in education and patient care

• Achieving full accreditation for its institutions and the programs by the accrediting organizations

• Striving to match its training programs to current and anticipated manpower needs, particularly of its community and that of the system through prioritization and coordination of program offerings.

AWARDS

Solucient Top 100 Hospitals Performance Improvement Leaders 2005

St. Vincent Mercy Medical Center is being recognized as one of 100 hospitals making the greatest progress in improving hospital-wide performance over five years when compared with 2,744 peer hospitals.

Solucient, the nation's leading source of healthcare information products, named St. V's one of the nation's top 100 performance improvement leader hospitals as a result of this accomplishment.

St. V's is among the nation's leaders for setting national benchmarks for consistent improvement in clinical outcomes, safety, hospital efficiency, financial stability and growth.

"We are honored to be recognized as one of the nation's top performing teaching hospitals and proud to be leading the wayin national patient quality and safety efforts," said Jeffrey Peterson, president and chief executive officer of St. V's.  "All of us have worked diligently to ensure that patients, their families, physicians and the northwest Ohio community can come to St. V's and receive the highest quality care."

St. V's, its management team, medical staff and Board of Trustees are recognized for developing an effective organization-wide culture of performance improvement and generating consistent organizational improvement over five years at a significantly faster rate than its peers.

Performance measures were examined at each hospital in the study, including:  risk-adjusted mortality and complications, average length of stay, expenses, profitability, growth in patient volume, tangible assets and risk-adjusted patient safety index.

Jeffrey D. Peterson, President and Chief Executive Officer Response

St. Vincent Mercy Medical Center was recently named among the nation's Top 100 Performance Improvement Leaders by Solucient, the nation's leading source of healthcare information products.

St. Vincent was recognized for being one of only 100 hopsitals making the greatest progress in improving hospital-wide performance over five years compared with 2,744 hospitals.  As a top hospital, St. vincent set benchmarks for consistent improvement in clinical outcomes, safety, hospital efficiency, stability and growth. 

Specifically, St. Vincent and the hospital's management team, medical staff and Board of Trustees have been recognized for:

• Developing an effective organization-wide culture of performance improvement
  
• Generating consistent organizational improvement over five years at a significantly faster rate than their peers

We are honored to be recognized as one of the nation's top performing teaching hospitals and are proud to be leading the way in national patient quality and safety efforts.  All of us have worked diligently to ensure that patients, their families, physicians and the northwest Ohio community can come to St. Vincent and receive the highest quality care.

Evidence of our level of care was found in the results of the study, which found that the top 100 performance improvement leader hospitals had fewer than expected complications, deaths and adverse safety events; improved financial stability; low increases in expenses; solid growth in patient volume and an earlier patient discharge average.  All of these results are marks we can be proud of.

Sincerely,

Jeffrey D. Peterson
President and Chief Executive Officer

HealthGrades 2006 Distinguished Hospital Award for Patient Safety

St. Vincent is recognized for best practice by JCAHO

The Joint commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) recognizes St. Vincent Mercy Medical Center as a best practice model for its medication reconciliatin program, which accurately ensures that all medications a patient is taking, both prescription and over the counter, are safe and do not interfere with one another.

As a result of the recognition, JCAHO profiled St. Vincent and Mercy Children's Hospital in its "Focus on Medication Reconciliation" educational program, which will be broadcast on June 8 over its Satellite Network, to which more than 700 hospitals throughout the country subscribe.  Through the program, St. Vincent and Mercy Children's are profiled as a model for hospitals across the country on how to implement a medication reconciliation program successfully.  In the video, Kelley Shultz, M.D., and others from St. Vincent and Mercy Children's speak about the importance of having an effective reconciliation process and the steps taken to implement this process in Mercy Health Partners' Electronic Health Record.

"We are extremely honored that the Joint Commission sees our program as one of the best in the U.S.," said Jeff Peterson, president and CEO of St. Vincent.  "All of us, from our physicians and nurses to our Pharmacy and information technology staff, have worked diligently to create a system that ensures safety and quality care for our patients throughout their stay and beyond."

JCAHO is the nation's predominant standards-setting and accrediting body in health care, evaluating and accrediting more than 15,000 health care organizations and programs in the United States. 

In 2006, JCAHO established a new goal requiring all hospitals to accurately reconcile medications, including home medications, vitamins and herbals, across the continuum of care.

"Medication errors are one of the most common causes of sentinel events and can be widely prevented through the creation of a medication reconciliation program," said Dr. Shultz, assistant director of Inpatient Pediatrics for Mercy Children's Hospital.  "By creating additional measures, we are working to ensure patient safety, which is our number one goal."

St. Vincent created a computerized program that flags potential medication errors and allows for the physician to review them before medications are administered.  The system can also provide detailed instructions to patients upon discharge about their medications.  In addition, the hospital uses Admin-RX, a hand held electronic device that scans and matches the barcodes on a patient's wrist band, the nurse's identification badge and the medication.

"Hospitals and care providers all across the country are struggling with medication reconciliation.  To be recognized as one of the leaders is a huge honor and a reflection of the dedication of our medical, nursing and ancillary staffs," Dr. Shultz said.

Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education awards five year accreditation to Mercy Health Partners' teaching hospitals  and commends Mercy Health Partners Graduate Medical Education for its "Best Practices" - June 5, 2006

The Institutional Review Commitee(IRC), which is a standing committee of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education(ACGME) that accredits 702 sponsoring institutions across the nation, recently reviewed Mercy Health Partners(MHP) and its teaching hospitals for accreditation.

MHP was awarded "Continued Accreditation" for 5 years with no citations or concerns. Our next site visit will be in Apirl of 2011.  This places MHP in the top decile in the country for GME(Graduate Medical Education) quality and is a testimony to its standards of excellence for graduate medical education. The committee went further in its commendation by citing MHP's use of Best Practices.

Quoting from the letter from the ACGME "The IRC commends the institution on its best practices and encourages the GMEC(Graduate Medical Education Comittee) to continue its efforts to support excellence in GME."  In particular, The IRC noted the institution's adaptation of the Balanced Score Card approach as an organizational tool to create accountabilities, transparency, and alignment of resources with its GME initiatives."

This high praise from the ACGME confirms what everyone in GME at Mercy Health Partners have long known, medical education at Mercy Health Partners ranks with the best in the country.