Wadley Regional Medical Center has become Texarkana's first accredited chest pain center thanks to a recent accreditation by the American College of Cardiology.
"We're proud of this. This is a good thing," said Dr. Scott Black, medical director of the Wadley chest pain program. "There are over 157 criteria they expect us to meet or exceed."
The goal of the program is to reduce the time it takes for patients to receive treatment, increase the accuracy and effectiveness of treatment which will significantly reduce the mortality rate of heart attack patients.
"This rigorous process to become a chest pain accredited hospital is an important step to reinforce the quality of care given at Wadley," said Thomas Gilbert, president of Wadley. "By reaching this status, Wadley has demonstrated its commitment to offering high standards of cardiac care to our community. This is an important achievement for the hospital and is a direct result of our physicians' and staff's hard work."
"It's always good when something you work hard on comes to fruition. It didn't come easy," Gilbert said. "Years ago we became a leader in stroke care and we thought we needed to do that for chest pain as well. It's an advantage to the community."
The accreditation took team work from multiple departments and also first responders who bring patients to the hospital.
"There's a great team that's gone into making this effort possible. That includes EMS because they're the ones that get the ball rolling," said Dr. Bob Fry, Wadley, emergency room physician. "The most important thing is we have a team approach, not only from EMS but the nursing staff. Everybody is working in perfect harmony."
Heart attacks are the leading cause of death in the United States with 600,000 people dying annually of heart disease and more than 5 million people visit hospitals each year with chest pain.
Chest pain centers follow specific protocols to monitor patients when it's not clear if they're having a coronary event or not. This ensures patients aren't sent home too early or needlessly admitted.
Accredited pain centers must demonstrate expertise in the following areas:
- Integrating the emergency department with the local emergency medical system.
- Assessing, diagnosing and treating patients quickly.
- Effectively treating patients with low risk for acute coronary syndrome and no assignable cause for their symptoms.
- Continually seeking to improve processes and procedures.
- Ensuring chest pain center personnel competency and training.
- Maintaining organizational structure and commitment.
- Having a functional design that promotes optimal patient care.
- Supporting community outreach programs that educate the public to promptly seek medical care if they display symptoms of a possible heart attack.
Heart attack symptoms:
- chest pain or pressure
- arm pain
- neck pain
- back pain
- jaw pain
- sweating
- nausea and vomiting
- shortness of breath
- anxiety
- feeling of fullness
- excessive fatigue
- passing out or nearly passing out
Heart attack symptoms in women:
- right sided chest or arm pain
- abdominal pain
- extreme fatigue
- increasing shortness of breath
- dizziness
- nausea/vomiting
- upper back pain that travels to the jaw
- symptoms that can be described as flu-like