Beaufort Memorial Hospital earns recognition for stroke care, safety

Beaufort Memorial Hospital has achieved the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s highest level of recognition for stroke care.

This year, BMH was honored with the Get With The Guidelines-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award. Recipients must follow treatment guidelines at least 85 percent of the time for two or more consecutive 12-month periods and achieve a minimum 75 percent compliance with five of eight stroke quality measures.

The quality measures are designed to help hospital teams provide appropriate treatment based on the latest scientific evidence shown to raise patients’ survival rates and minimize permanent disability.

In addition, it qualified for Target: Stroke Honor Roll-Elite Plus status. To qualify, BMH had to meet quality measures developed to reduce the time it takes for patients to be diagnosed and treated with the clot-busting medication tPA. According to current guidelines, the drug should be started within 60 minutes of a patient’s arrival in the hospital to minimize brain damage and potential complications. BMH physicians averaged 44 minutes in 2016.

“With a stroke, minutes count,” said Shawna Doran, Beaufort Memorial vice president of quality services.

The fifth leading cause of death in the United States, stroke ranks as the No. 3 killer in South Carolina, part of an 11-state region in the United States known as the Stroke Belt.

BMH utilizes the Medical University of South Carolina Health Telestroke, a Web-based program that provides Emergency Department and Intensive Care Unit physicians with on-demand access to MUSC Health stroke experts for consultations.

BMH also was one of seven South Carolina health care organizations recognized as winners of a Palmetto Hospital Trust Safety Award at the PHT Worker Safety Symposium.

Health care professionals from around the state attended the two-day event, held last month in Charleston.

Safety Awards are presented each year to Palmetto Hospital Trust members with the lowest loss ratios in their respective categories. BMH was the winner in the category of hospitals with 101-500 beds.

This story was originally published June 19, 2017 at 11:47 AM with the headline "Beaufort Memorial Hospital earns recognition for stroke care, safety."