St. Vincent’s St. Clair has earned The Joint Commission’s Gold Seal of Approval™ for accreditation by demonstrating compliance with The Joint Commission’s national standards for health care quality and safety in hospitals. The accreditation award recognizes St. Vincent’s St. Clair’s dedication to continuous compliance with The Joint Commission’s state-of-the-art standards.
St. Vincent’s St. Clair underwent a rigorous, unannounced on-site survey in July. A team of Joint Commission expert surveyors evaluated St. Vincent’s St. Clair for compliance with standards of care specific to the needs of patients, including infection prevention and control, leadership and medication management.
Founded in 1951, The Joint Commission seeks to improve health care for the public by evaluating health care organizations and inspiring them to excel in providing safe and effective care of the highest quality. The Joint Commission evaluates and accredits more than 19,000 health care organizations in the United States, including more than 10,300 hospitals and home care organizations, and more than 6,500 other health care organizations that provide long term care, behavioral health care, laboratory and ambulatory care services.
Cullman Primary Care Multi-Specialty Group Achieves Better Performer Status
The MGMA Performance and Practices of Successful Medical Groups: 2012 Report Based on 2011 Data identified Cullman Primary Care Multi-Specialty Group as a “Better Performer” because of superior operational performance compared with similar medical group practices nationwide. The group was recognized in the areas of Profitability and Cost Management, Accounts Receivable and Patient Satisfaction. This is Cullman Primary Care Multi-Specialty Group’s sixth year to be selected as a Better Performer.
“We are pleased to be among such a successful assembly of our peer groups. The success of Cullman Primary Care Multi-Specialty Group is based on the belief that the patient always comes first. The group’s vision has been to conveniently provide health care services to our patients so they do not have to travel lengthy distances for their medical care”, said John Reynolds, CEO.
Medical West Psychiatric Unit Renovations
Renovations are currently underway on the Medical West Psychiatric Unit. This $1.4 million upgrade will increase beds from 15 to 25, expanding the current space to the north and east wing of the existing 6th floor.
The renovation also includes cosmetic upgrades for the entire 6th floor acute care unit. These improvements include wood flooring, paint and wall decor, a remodeled nurses’ station, and upgraded patient rooms. All renovations are projected to be completed by mid-December.
The new Psychiatric Unit at Medical West will specialize in geriatric psychiatry. With more than 15 surrounding nursing homes and an aging population, this expansion will provide needed psychiatric care to the elderly citizens of West Jefferson County.
Miklic Joins Trinty OB/GYN
Margaret Miklic, MD, has joined Trinity OB/GYN located at Trinity Medical Center.
A native of Gadsden, AL, Miklic received her medical degree from the University of Alabama School of Medicine. She completed her internship and residency with the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Ochsner Clinic Foundation in New Orleans. Prior to joining Trinity OB/GYN, Dr. Miklic was in practice with Ochsner St. Anne General Women’s Health Center in Raceland, LA.
Miklic is a member of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
UAB Medical Students Open Free Clinic
Equal Access Birmingham (EAB), a medical student group at the UAB School of Medicine recently opened clinic to provide medical care to underserved Jefferson County residents. The clinic, located in the Church of the Reconciler, provides basic primary care to residents in the Jefferson County Housing Authority Shelter Care Plus program.
The clinic operates on Sundays from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. and is managed and run by UAB medical students, with medical oversight by physicians from the school’s faculty. EAB students have also staffed a free clinic associated with M-Power Ministries in Avondale since 2007. EAB will continue to staff that clinic, which meets on Wednesday evenings and is designed to help provide acute care for the medically underserved, in addition to the new primary care clinic.
Allison team gets UAB’s first Transformative Research Award
A team of scientists from UAB and four other institutions, led by David Allison, PhD, associate dean for science in the UAB School of Public Health, has received a National Institutes of Health Transformative Research Award for $8 million to explore a novel hypothesis that links aging, obesity and health disparities.
This is the first time UAB investigators have received funding from the TR01 initiative, which is supported by the NIH Common Fund’s High Risk-High Reward program. The program was created to support innovative research projects that have the potential to change paradigms and may be too risky to fare well in conventional NIH review.
The UAB-led project, one of only 20 receiving awards in 2012, is titled “Energetics, Disparities, & Lifespan: A Unified Hypothesis.” It is anticipated to provide outcomes that will have profound implications in the understanding of the nature of aging, health disparities and obesity.
“We’re looking at whether a person’s confidence in their ability to secure food energy to survive affects the body’s efforts to store fat — and simultaneously leads to changes in the rate of aging,” Allison explains. “If it does, that suggests senescence is not a passive process, but is in fact something our body actively regulates in the same sense that we actively regulate body temperature.”
Allison says this research could also help explain why lower socioeconomic status is related to obesity in developed countries.
“Part of the reason that persons of lower socioeconomic status sometimes are more obese than those of higher socioeconomic status may have less to do with raw buying power and more to do with the perception of being on the bottom of the social totem pole, which leads to insecurity and, in turn, an increase in energy stores or body fat,” Allison says.
Allison credits the supportive environment at UAB for giving him the initiative to go after this award.
“These grants are hard to write because it requires a certain degree of courage to put forward an idea that is a little wild and crazy,” Allison says. “I think being in a situation where my colleagues are supportive, and being at an institution that understands that creative research means taking risks, helps tremendously.
Experiments for the project will begin in the next few months and additional funding for corresponding studies will also be explored over the course of this project
Jeffrey Jones, MD Appointed to Task Force
Jeffrey Jones, MD, FACEP, has been appointed to the Emergency Department Clinical Advisory Council, commonly referred to as the ED Task Force, for Community Health Systems (CHS). Jones, a member of the Trinity Medical Center medical staff since 2011, is board certified in Emergency Medicine.
The Task Force includes physicians, nursing and administrative representatives from each of the five CHS Divisions. Task Force members are recognized for their high performance in Emergency Department medicine, nursing and operations.
The ED Task Force has been instrumental in providing opinions and decisions in many areas related to emergency medicine, including enhancement requests to computer documentation systems, implementation and testing of ED initiatives, test mapping guidelines, as well as protocols addressing standards of care and standardization of terminology.
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Weaver of Shelby Baptist Named Legislator of the Year
April Weaver, who serves as Director of Business Development at Shelby Baptist Medical Center, has been named Outstanding Alabama Legislator of the Year for 2012 by The Alabama State Nurses Association (ASNA). The ASNA Legislator of the Year Award is given annually to a state legislator who has been an active proponent of healthcare issues in Alabama. This is Rep. Weaver’s second year in a row to receive this honor.
In her first two years as a State Representative, Weaver has been quick to assume leadership in a number of issues. Earlier this year, she sponsored a bill that will help the nursing profession train faculty members in an effort to help address the growing demand for healthcare as baby boomers age. Weaver was also a primary speaker at the ASNA “Nurses at the Capitol” rally last April.
Weaver represents parts Shelby and Bibb Counties, including the cities of Alabaster, Pelham and Helena, in the Alabama Legislature. She has a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the University of Alabama, is a licensed Registered Nurse and has also completed an MBA. She has worked in healthcare management for over 18 years and is presently the Director of Business Development at Shelby Baptist Medical Center in Alabaster.
UAB School of Medicine Campus Announced for Montgomery
In an effort to help alleviate the shortage of rural physicians, the UAB School of Medicine is opening the Montgomery Regional Campus. This is the third regional campus for the School of Medicine — the others are in Huntsville and Tuscaloosa.
The new Montgomery campus, which will make use of facilities at Baptist Health, is a collaborative effort among UAB, Baptist Health and the city of Montgomery, and adds to the existing UAB Montgomery Internal Medicine Residency Training Program. Ten third-year medical students will begin taking classes in Montgomery in May 2014; in 2015, the incoming class size will expand to 20.
The shortage of primary care physicians is a nationwide problem. Alabama has 68.3 primary care physicians per 100,000 people, ranking the state 45th in the country. “There is a dearth of primary care physicians in the River Region of Central Alabama, and the average age of doctors is over 50,” says Wick Many, MD, former director of the Montgomery Internal Medicine Residency Program and the newly appointed regional dean of the Montgomery branch campus.
The UAB School of Medicine’s regional campuses were created in large part to meet the need for more primary care physicians in Alabama, and it has been working. At regional campuses in Huntsville and Tuscaloosa, 52 percent of graduates enter primary care. At the main campus in Birmingham, the majority of graduates — 74 percent — choose non-primary care specialties.
The new campus “represents an important component of our primary care strategic plan and will have a major impact on health-care delivery in Central Alabama,” says Ray L. Watts, MD, dean of the UAB School of Medicine. “This is an important responsibility as we strive to provide the best health-care possible for the citizens of Alabama.”
Data show that doctors have a tendency to practice where they train: Overall, 44 percent of UAB medical students stay in Alabama for their residencies; 57 percent of graduates from regional campuses stay in Alabama to practice and 30 percent of them practice primary care in the state.
The Montgomery campus will provide an option to stay closer to home for many medical students. More than seven percent of medical students at UAB came from Montgomery and the surrounding counties; between 16 percent and 18 percent came from Southeast Alabama. “For these students, choosing the Montgomery campus could help ease their debt burden if they can live at home, and they’ll have more family support,” Many says.
Ed Lynch Joins Mag Mutual
Mag Mutuall Insurance Company recently added Ed Lynch to the senior management team. Appointed Senior Vice President of Business Development, Lynch will lead the sales, service and marketing divisions for the physician-owned mutual.
Lynch brings more than 20 years of professional liability insurance experience in both the intermediary and company side of the insurance industry, almost exclusively working in the healthcare market. He holds a master’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania, attended the Weatherhood School of Management at Case Western Reserve University and has a bachelor’s degree from Hiram College.
Accelerated Physical Therapy Expands Facility
Accelerated Physical Therapy recently held a grand opening for the expansion of the practice’s Trussville facility. The Trussville clinic, originally 2000 square feet, has added 2800 square feet of new space. The new treatment area incorporates a larger space for patient care, as well as three private treatment rooms including a room for lumbar decompression therapy. The clinic also now contains an area dedicated to worker’s compensation patients.
The clinic is open to patients from seven am to six pm.
Gilreath Joins Cullman Internal Medicine
Paul Gilreach, MD, a neurologist, has joined Cullman Internal Medicine. Gilreach, a is native of Cleveland, Georgia, is a graduate of the University of Berry College in Rome, Georgia, and received his medical degree from Medical College of Georgia. He completed his medical training in Neurology at Shands University of Florida.
Jefferson County Workforce Investment Selects St. Vincent’s JHA
The Jefferson County Workforce Investment Act Youth program has selected St. Vincent’s Health System’s Jeremiah’s Hope Academy (JHA) as one of a select few groups to partner with to assist youth in achieving their education and employment goals.
“Being a part of Jeremiah’s Hope Academy helped encourage me to want more and do more for my life,” explained Gabrielle Scott, a July graduate of the training program affiliated with St. Vincent’s Health System. Scott is now a Certified Sterile Processing Technician and employed full time.
JHA is a licensed postsecondary school that provides training in seven entry-level healthcare careers. The education meets eligibility requirements for graduates to sit for national certification examinations. JHA has teamed with the Jefferson County WIA Youth program to provide a way for out-of-school youth, aged 18-21, to receive the training they need to become employed in healthcare jobs in Birmingham.
Yehlen Joins DCH
Lorraine M. Yehlen recently joined the DCH Health System as vice president of patient care services/chief nursing officer.
Yehlen has more than 35 years of health care experience in a variety of roles at staff, teaching and leadership levels. She spent much of her career working for SSM Health Care in St. Louis. SSM owns 17 hospitals and has affiliations with many other hospitals and nursing homes.
As vice president of patient care services for the SSM Healthcare South Operating Group (three hospitals), Yehlen worked with multiple campuses, assisting with the integration of operations and cultures. She facilitated the implementation of relationship-based nursing care and assisted with the implementation of an electronic medical record system and computerized physician order entry.
Yehlen was formerly network executive director for senior services and community outreach for SSM and served as vice president of patient care services and clinical director of ambulatory care services for Cardinal Glennon Children’s Medical Center in St. Louis.
She holds a master of arts degree in health services management from Webster University and a bachelor of science in nursing degree from Maryville University in St. Louis.
Granger Speaks in Arizona
Keith Granger, President and CEO of Trinity Medical Center, was recently a guest speaker at the Arizona Hospital and Healthcare Association’s Quality Collaborative in Glendale, Arizona.
Granger’s presentation, “Building Sustainable Systems to Achieve Optimal Quality and Patient Care,” focused on his success in achieving excellent quality and safety results at Trinity Medical Center. More than 350 healthcare professionals attended the conference.
