Shady Grove Adventist and Washington Adventist Hospitals Receive American Heart Association's Performance Achievement Awards

Shady Grove Adventist and Washington Adventist hospitals receive American Heart Association’s Performance Achievement Awards 

Story by Diana M. Troese

Shady Grove Adventist and Washington Adventist hospitals – both part of Adventist HealthCare (AHC)– received the American Heart Association’s (AHA) Mission: Lifeline Bronze Performance Achievement Awards. These awards recognize the hospitals’ commitment and success in implementing a higher standard of care for patients experiencing the deadliest type of heart attack known as STEMI (ST Elevation Myocardial Infarction).

“We are honored to receive this recognition from the American Heart Association,” says Terry Forde, AHC president and CEO and interim president of Washington Adventist Hospital in Takoma Park, Md. “This is a testament to the expert, high-quality care that the dedicated Adventist cardiac teams provide to our community on a daily basis.”

The Mission Lifeline Bronze award signifies that both hospitals met the AHA’s highest goals for quality care over 90 consecutive days. These goals include timeliness of diagnosis and intervention as well as guidelines for discharge that promote the prevention of future cardiac events. This includes risk-reduction therapies, such as cholesterol-lowering drugs, aspirin, ACE inhibitors and beta-blockers in the hospital and smoking cessation counseling at discharge.

“Our cardiac teams have measures in place to ensure we are consistently providing effective, timely care,” says Dennis Friedman, MD, medical director of cardiology and cardiovascular research at Shady Grove Adventist in Rockville, Md. “As part of our care, we provide patients with educational information and tools to reduce their likelihood of a repeat episode.”

Each year in the United States, approximately 250,000 people have a STEMI caused by a complete blockage of blood flow to the heart that requires timely treatment.

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