healthy hospitals
SAN JOAQUIN GENERAL HOSPITAL WINS A PERFORMANCE EXCELLENCE AWARD FOR CONGESTIVE HEART FAILURE CARE BY CREIGHTON YOUNNEL
San Joaquin General Hospital has won the California Public Hospital Association’s (CAPH) prestigious 2019 Quality Leaders award for Improving Heart Failure (HF) Outcomes at San Joaquin General Hospital. The Statewide award highlights the Hospital’s Primary Medicine Department’s Multidisciplinary Team-Based Approach in the CAPH Performance Excellence category. According to the American Heat Assn. reports that 5.7 million adults in the U.S. have heart failure costing the nation an estimated 30 billion annually. The congestive heart failure (CHF) rate in San Joaquin County 38
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2020 SJ HEALTH AND MEDICAL GUIDE
exceeds both the state and national rate. San Joaquin General Hospital, under the leadership of Moshen Saadat, DO, FACP Chairman of the Hospital’s Internal Medicine Dept., assembled a clinical team to identify and address congestive heart failure outcomes coming to San Joaquin General and SJ County Clinics. “Here at San Joaquin General we experienced the same escalating prevalence and challenges in HF management as exists nationally”, says Dr. Sadaat. “Despite having a “traditional specialty CHF clinic,” during a 12-month period of this study, our re-admission, length of stay when admitted, and number of ED visits for our HF patients increased, while utilization of the
clinic by our HF patients actually declined. We saw the opportunity to improve and we acted on it. Seven out of ten pivotal issues addressed by the 2017 ACC (American College of Cardiology) expert consensus paper for the optimization of HF involves addressing the challenges of care coordination, improving adherence, managing co-morbidities, integration of palliative care, and transition to hospice care. Our institutional goal was to create a multidisciplinary clinic that reduces HF related admissions and ED visits, to provide whole person care while specifically addressing HF and related co-morbidities. We centered the care around the patients’ needs. Our aim was to engage and more importantly empower our patients to improve their health and try to make care not only more accessible, but more convenient for our patients.” The new CHF Clinic assembled a Hospital and Clinic wide team consisting of the Hospital’s medical staff, pharmacy department, and nurse managers. “When we see patients in the heart failure clinic, we spend extra time focusing on the medications. We ensure our patients are on the most appropriate guideline-directed therapy and understand the importance of taking all of their medications appropriately” says Hospital Pharmacist Jared, Pharm. D, BCPSAQ ID. The redesigned multidisciplinary CHF Clinic has reduced HF Hospital and emergency visits. San Joaquin General Hospital’s team approach to HF management follows the Hospital’s mission of providing the optimal, compassionate care to the residents of San Joaquin County. San Joaquin General Hospital sees over 30,000 patients annually and also has 105,000 primary care visits annually. SAN JOAQUIN GENERAL HOSPITAL 500 W. Hospital Rd., French Camp (209) 468-6000 SJGeneral.org
