Tour de Blue: Cycling for Prostate Cancer Awareness – April 26
The Urology Health Foundation’s 7th annual Tour de Blue bicycle ride will be held Saturday, April 26th. The ride starts and finishes at the 65-acre corporate campus of Red Diamond in Moody, Alabama. There are several exciting cycling routes, including a Century, 75 & 50 mile option. All routes offer rolling SAG support and well-stocked rest stops. The cost is $50.00 and includes an event t-shirt and a post-ride meal provided by Jim ‘N Nick’s Bar-B-Q. Early bird discounts are available on Active.com. The ride benefits the Urology Health Foundation’s prostate cancer screening and awareness efforts across Alabama. For further information and to register, please visit www.tourdeblue.com or contact Sherry Wilson at 205-445-0117 or swilson@urologyal.com.
St. Vincent’s Heart Screenings
St. Vincent’s Health System provided heart screenings to more than 1,400 community members for its annual Heart Day on Saturday, February 15.
St. Vincent’s offered participants four heart tests from at nine locations. For $40, participants received: an EKG, a Lipid Profile, a Blood Pressure Screening, a Basic Metabolic Profile, and a T-shirt.
“At St. Vincent’s, we’re dedicated to offering our community the knowledge and tools they need to take control of their heart health,” said John O’Neil, president and COO. “Our annual Heart Day is an important first step in educating yourself on your heart numbers, and we encourage the community to continue taking advantage of this opportunity.”
Alabama Allergy Opens New Location
Alabama Allergy & Asthma Center has opened their new location at 2100 Data Park in Hoover. To celebrate the new office, Alabama Allergy hosted an Open House in February for physicians and the community. This location is open Monday through Friday and has appointments available same day.
IT 4 the Planet Acquires Integrated Solutions
Knoxville-based information technology firm, IT 4 the Planet, has acquired Birmingham-based Integrated Solutions. J. E. Henry will continue to serve as the company’s Chief Executive Officer. Curtis Woods, COO for Alabama, will continue to manage the Alabama client base.
Integrated Solutions provides technology services to medical, legal, and professional practices with expertise in high-tech security assessment and network support for more than 200 clients.
Russ Dorsey, President and CEO of Integrated Solutions built Integrated Solutions into one of Birmingham’s leading IT companies. “With 20 years of loyal customer relationships to consider, I can’t imagine a better way this could have worked out,” Dorsey said. “The IT 4 the Planet management team and I were on the same page regarding how our clients and employees should be treated and how this transition should be managed with minimal change. I am very confident that the IT 4 the Planet team will continue and build upon our 20 year commitment to excellence in customer service.”
These assets add to the slate of IT solutions that are offered by its new parent company, IT 4 the Planet, which is a technology solutions provider that offers consulting, storage, data management solutions, security assessments, e-commerce support, data base creation and software development services including high-end web site design and development.
Princeton Names Sarah Dudley Chief Operating Officer
Princeton Baptist Medical Center has added the position of a chief operating officer position to its administrative structure and has named Sarah Dudley, Princeton assistant administrator, to the role. As COO, Dudley will assume leadership over the clinical laboratory, pharmacy, inpatient and outpatient physical therapy, and the wound care center, in addition to continuing her previous responsibilities.
In her position as assistant administrator at Princeton Dudley was responsible for invasive and non-invasive cardiology, pulmonary rehabilitation, diagnostic imaging, cancer services, breast care center, medical relations and marketing and the Baptist Vein Center at Baptist Health Center Hoover, as well as strategic planning and business development. She also served as director of operations and business development.
She received her Master of Science, magna cum laude, in health administration from UAB, and her Bachelor of Science in biomedical sciences and a minor in business from Auburn University. In addition, she completed an internship at Baylor University Medical Center in 2008 followed by a one-year administrative residency at Princeton in 2009.
Trinity Performs Among Top 1 Percent of Hospitals Nationwide
Trinity Medical Center has earned a No. 1 rating for its performance on key quality of care measures, according to information released recently on The Commonwealth Fund website WhyNotTheBest.org. The hospital is the only facility in Alabama, and among only 21 of 1,873 facilities rated nationwide, to receive the top score of 100 percent.
WhyNotTheBest.org is maintained by The Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation that aims to promote a high-performing healthcare system. The site allows healthcare providers and consumers to examine hospitals of a particular geographic area, size, specialty or other categories, and compare the hospitals by quality performance.
The website reports hospitals’ performance based on publicly available data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, as well as data from the American Hospital Association, Institute of Medicine and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Among the data included in the reports are process-of-care measures, patient satisfaction scores, readmission rates and mortality rates, as well as the incidence of central line-associated bloodstream infections, the extent of electronic medical record adoption, measures of population health and measures of patient safety.
Trinity was also recently honored by The Joint Commission as one of the nation’s Top Performers on Key Quality Measures®, a distinction honoring exemplary performance in using evidence-based clinical processes that are shown to improve care for certain conditions, including heart attack, heart failure, pneumonia, surgical care, children’s asthma, stroke and venous thrombo embolism, as well as inpatient psychiatric services.
UAB Has 323 Doctors Ranked Best
The 2013-14 list of the Best Doctors in America® recognizes 323 UAB physicians in 65 specialties who are among the top five percent of clinicians in the United States, as voted by their peers. This is the second year in a row that UAB has had more than 320 physicians ranked on this list.
Best Doctors is an independent medical referral service headquartered in Boston. Its surveys ask peer physicians, “If you or a loved one needed a doctor in your specialty, to whom would you refer them?”
Nominations for the list are anonymous and doctors’ evaluations are confidential. The system of review includes a method of correcting bias for or against particular physicians or groups of physicians. Listings cannot be purchased.
Cullman’s Warner Earns Certification
G. Scott Warner, MD, FACP, FCCP, FAASM of Cullman Regional Medical Center has achieved a new board certification from the American Board of Emergency Medicine (ABEM) in the new subspecialty of Emergency Medical Services. EMS is a medical subspecialty involving pre-hospital emergency patient care such as initial patient stabilization, treatment and transportation of patients in ambulances or helicopters to hospitals.
Warner has served as Medical Director of CRMC’s Cullman Emergency Medical Services (CEMS) since 2001. Under his leadership, CEMS pioneered the use of CPAP for respiratory distress in order to avoid respiratory failure — this has become required now by all EMS agencies in the State of Alabama. CEMS also added hypothermia treatment after cardiac arrest which helps preserve brain function following a heart attack.
UAB names new chair of Health Services Administration
Christy Harris Lemak, PhD, has been named chair of the UAB Department of Health Services Administration. Lemak comes to UAB from the University of Michigan, where she served as director of the Griffith Leadership Center in Health Management and Policy.
Lemak is a fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives; a board member of the Association of University Programs in Health Administration, an elected position she has held since 2009; and an expert adviser for the Center for Healthcare Research and Transformation. In 2011, she earned the Excellence in Teaching Award from the Academy of Management Health Care Management Division.
At UAB, Lemak will continue her research, including studying high-performing hospitals, identifying clinical practices to improve outcomes, and exploring innovative population health approaches for uninsured and Medicaid patients.
Sease Joins DCH
Peggy Sease has been named vice president, human resources for DCH Health System.
Sease formerly served as vice president of human resources at Southeast Alabama Medical Center, a nonprofit multihospital system in Dothan. She also worked for University Hospital in Augusta, Georgia, where she held the roles of director of human resources and director of education.
Sease received her Master of Education degree from the University of South Carolina and her Bachelor of Science degree from Winthrop University.
She is a member of the American College of Healthcare Executives and the Society of Human Resources. In 2007, she earned the SPHR, the Senior Professional in Human Resources® certification.
Samford’s Online Nursing Programs Climb in National Ranking
Graduate programs in Samford University’s Ida V. Moffett School of Nursing climbed to number 24 for online education in new national rankings released by U.S. News & World Report. Samford was in the top 25 percent of all the accredited nursing schools included in this year’s overall rankings.
Samford was ranked 35 in last year’s rankings.
Online programs within the nursing school offer master’s degrees in family nurse practitioner, nurse educator, and health systems management. Samford also offers the doctor of nursing practice as a distance learning degree.
Other Alabama schools in the rankings are University of Alabama-Huntsville (6), Troy University (52), University of South Alabama in Mobile (56), and Spring Hill College in Mobile (82).
Sanders Trust Acquires Boston Hospitals
The Sanders Trust, a healthcare real estate development company based in Birmingham, has acquired two Boston-area hospitals: New England and Braintree Rehabilitation Hospitals.
The $90 million acquisition closed when Senior Housing Properties Trust and affiliates sold the hospitals to The Sanders Trust in a joint venture with its capital partner Harrison Street Real Estate Capital, LLC of Chicago.
Bolen Appointed to Trinity Medical Center Board of Trustees
Joseph B. Bolen, III, has been appointed to the Trinity Medical Center Board of Trustees.
Bolen retired in 2008 from Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama after serving as Senior Vice President of Health Care Networks. Prior to that appointment, Bolen was Vice President of Provider Affairs.
During his 40 years in the health care industry Bolen also worked for the University of Alabama Hospitals where he was Director of Admissions before being promoted to Assistant Administrator.
Currently, Bolen serves on the Legacy Community Federal Credit Union board of directors; is active with the University of Alabama Commerce Executive Society and the University of Alabama Alumni Association; and serves on the Finance Committee for Trinity United Methodist Church.