Huntington Memorial Hospital Honored With Quality Achievement Award for Stroke Care

Huntington Memorial Hospital has received the Get With The Guidelines®-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award for implementing specific quality improvement measures outlined by the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association for the treatment of stroke patients.

“We are pleased to recognize Huntington Hospital for their commitment and dedication to stroke care”

Get With The Guidelines-Stroke helps hospital teams provide the most up-to-date, research-based guidelines with the goal of speeding recovery and reducing death and disability for stroke patients. Huntington Hospital earned the award by meeting specific quality achievement measures for the rapid diagnosis and treatment of stroke patients at a set level for a designated period. These measures include aggressive use of medications and risk-reduction therapies aimed at reducing death and disability and improving the lives of stroke patients.

“The Get With The Guidelines-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award demonstrates Huntington Hospital’s commitment to being one of the top hospitals in the country for providing aggressive, proven stroke care,” said Arbi Ohanian, M.D., medical director of Huntington Hospital’s Primary Stroke Center. “We are committed to ensuring that our patients receive care based on internationally respected clinical guidelines.”

“We are pleased to recognize Huntington Hospital for their commitment and dedication to stroke care,” said Deepak L. Bhatt, M.D., M.P.H., national chairman of the Get With The Guidelines steering committee and executive director of Interventional Cardiovascular Programs at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. “Studies have shown that hospitals that consistently follow Get With The Guidelines quality-improvement measures can reduce patients’ length of stays and 30-day readmission rates and reduce disparity gaps in care.”

Get With The Guidelines-Stroke also helps Huntington Hospital’s staff implement prevention measures, which include educating stroke patients to manage their risk factors and to be aware of warning signs for stroke and ensuring they take their medications properly. Hospitals can make customized patient education materials available upon discharge, based on the patients’ individual risk profiles. The take-away materials are written in an easy-to-understand format in either English or Spanish.

According to the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association, stroke is the No. 4 cause of death and a leading cause of adult 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.

Huntington Hospital’s stroke center is distinguished as a certified primary stroke center by The Joint Commission, the foremost accrediting body in healthcare in the United States. This designation is awarded to select centers that pass a rigorous on-site review and a thorough examination of the program and patient care. The certification recognizes the hospital’s commitment to following national standards and guidelines that can significantly improve outcomes for stroke patients. Huntington Hospital’s stroke center is also an approved stroke center for Los Angeles County Emergency Medical Services.

About Get With The Guidelines

Get With The Guidelines® is the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s hospital-based quality improvement program that provides hospitals with the latest research-based guidelines. Developed with the goal of saving lives and hastening recovery, Get With The Guidelines has touched the lives of more than 4 million patients since 2001. For more information, visit heart.org/quality or heart.org/myhealthcare.

About Huntington Hospital

Huntington Memorial Hospital, www.HuntingtonHospital.com, is a 625-bed not-for-profit hospital located in Pasadena, California. Huntington Hospital has been ranked nationally by U.S. News and World Report in two specialties and was named among the top hospitals in California. The hospital is on Facebook at www.facebook.com/HuntingtonMemorialHospital and on Twitter at @HuntingtonNews.

For more information about Huntington Hospital contact Derek Clark at (626) 397-3241 or email derek.clark@huntingtonhospital.com