Awards and Designations Excellence at Good Shepherd Medical Center Longview

Good Shepherd Medical Center Named One of the Nation's 100 Top Hospitals by Truven Health Analytics

LONGVIEW, TX – April 22, 2013 – Good Shepherd Medical Center was recently named one of the nation’s 100 Top Hospitals® by Truven Health Analytics formerly the healthcare business of Thomson Reuters. Truven Health Analytics is a leading provider of information and solutions to improve the cost and quality of healthcare.

The Truven Health 100 Top Hospitals® study evaluates performance in 10 areas: mortality; medical complications; patient safety; average patient stay; expenses; profitability; patient satisfaction; adherence to clinical standards of care; post-discharge mortality; and readmission rates for acute myocardial infarction (heart attack), heart failure, and pneumonia. The study is celebrating its 20th year, and has been conducted annually since 1993.

“We are proud to have received another notable recognition for the high level of quality care provided to the patients of Good Shepherd Medical Center,” said Ken Cunningham, executive vice president and interim chief executive officer. “It is humbling to be included among the most reputable hospitals in the country for consistently providing a high level of quality medical care to our patients. The Longview community and East Texas area residents are the true winners to have care of this quality level available to them in their own area and now know they have no reason to travel to larger cities like Dallas or Houston to receive advanced medical care.”

In addition to being included in the 100 Top Hospitals, Good Shepherd also received the Everest Award which honors a special group of the 100 Top Hospitals award winners that has achieved benchmark status for one-year performance and has simultaneously set national benchmarks for the fastest long-term improvement on Truven Healthcare’s national balanced scorecard.

100 Top Hospitals Everest Award winners set national benchmarks for both long-term (five-year*) improvement and highest one-year performance on the 100 Top Hospitals Balanced Scorecard. Everest Award winners are selected from among the new 100 Top Hospitals award winners. The methodology for selecting the Everest Award winners can be summarized in three main steps:

CHRISTUS Good Shepherd Health System is proud to announce that it is among the first health care organizations in the country to earn ClearHealth Quality Institute™ (CHQI) accreditation for telemedicine. CHQI is an independent health care accrediting body that offers the only telemedicine or telehealth accreditation program backed by the American Telemedicine Association (ATA).

Learn more.

The American Association of Cardiovascular and Pulmonary Rehabilitation is a multidisciplinary professional association comprised of health professionals who serve in the field of cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation. The AACVPR certification recognizes a hospital’s pulmonary rehabilitation center’s commitment to providing patients a high standard level of car and improving their quality of life.

CGS received the American College of Cardiology’s NCDR Chest Pain – MI Registry Bronze Performance Achievement Award for 2020. Only 35 hospitals nationwide receive the honor. The award recognizes CGS’s commitment and success in implementing a higher standard of care for heart attack patients and signified that CGS has reached an aggressive goal of treating these patients to standard levels of care as outlined by the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association clinical guidelines and recommendations.

Good Shepherd has received 2017 quality award rankings from CareChex, an information service of Quantros, Inc. These rankings listed Good Shepherd Medical Center as #1 in the Market for Medical Excellence in Overall Hospital Care, Overall Medical Care and Overall Surgical Care and in the Top 100 in the nation for Medical Excellence in 15 areas.

Overall Medical Care
Overall Surgical Care
Cardiac Care
Gallbladder Removal
Gastrointestinal Hemorrhage
General Surgery
Heart Attack Treatment
Heart Failure Treatment
Interventional Coronary Care
Orthopedic Care
Pneumonia Care
Spinal Fusion
Spinal Surgery
Vascular Care

Good Shepherd also ranked in the Top 5 hospitals in the state for Medical Excellence in the following areas: 

Overall Hospital Care - #2
Heart Attack Care - #2
Pneumonia Care - #2
Overall Medical Care - #4
Cardiac Care - #4
Heart Failure Treatment - #4
Orthopedic Care - #4
Vascular Surgery - #4
Gall Bladder Removal - #5
General Surgery - #5

Good Shepherd Medical Center has received the American Heart Association’s Mission: Lifeline® Heart Attack Receiving Center Accreditation.

LONGVIEW, TX (July 8, 2016) – Good Shepherd Medical Center has received the American Heart Association’s Mission: Lifeline® Heart Attack Receiving Center Accreditation.
 
The accreditation program — sponsored by the American Heart Association and the Society of Cardiovascular Patient Care — recognizes centers that meet or exceed quality of care measures for people experiencing the most severe type of heart attack, ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), in which blood flow is completely blocked to a portion of the heart.
 
Good Shepherd joins just nine other Texas hospitals that have achieved the accreditation, and is the only hospital in North Texas with the distinction.
 
“Good Shepherd is committed to providing our patients the highest quality cardiac care centered on current scientific research,” said Steve Altmiller, Good Shepherd Health System president and chief executive officer. “The American Heart Association’s Mission: Lifeline® Heart Attack Receiving Center Accreditation has highlighted our accomplishments and substantiates the overall quality of care our patients are receiving.”
 
Through its accreditation program, the American Heart Association hopes to significantly reduce cardiac death by teaching the public to recognize and react to early symptoms of a heart attack, reduce the time it takes to receive lifesaving treatment and increase the accuracy and effectiveness of treatment administered.  

Becker's Names Good Shepherd Medical Center as a 100 Great Community Hospital for Second Year

LONGVIEW, TX—Becker's Hospital Review recently announced its list of “100 Great Community Hospitals,” which recognized Good Shepherd Medical Center as one of five Texas hospitals to make the list based on quality of care and service to the community. The “100 Great Community Hospitals” list recognizes high-performing hospitals that have fewer than 550 beds and smaller teaching programs.

To compile this list, the Becker's Hospital Review editorial team selected community hospitals based on rankings and awards from iVantage Health Analytics, Truven Health Analytics (formerly Thomson Reuters), Healthgrades and The Joint Commission.

“We are honored to be included in this list for the second year in a row,” Ken Cunningham, executive vice president and interim CEO, said. “This year, Good Shepherd has been ranked among the top hospitals not only in Texas but in the nation as well, and we are again honored to be recognized by a leading healthcare publication.”

According to Becker’s, community hospitals are a critical component to the American healthcare continuum. These hospitals are often the anchors of health and employment within their communities, providing patients with top-quality care close to home. The following hospitals have demonstrated commitments to the health of their local population through clinical excellence, community involvement and various other efforts. 

The Good Shepherd Center for Bariatric Surgery has been accredited as a Comprehensive Center under the Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery Accreditation and Quality Improvement Program (MBSAQIP), a joint program of the American College of Surgeons (ACS) and the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery (ASMBS). 

LONGVIEW, TX (December 15, 2016) – The Good Shepherd Center for Bariatric Surgery has received an upgrade in its accreditation from the nation’s top surveyor of surgical weight loss programs.

Dustin McDermott, MD, FACS, medical director of the Center for Bariatric Surgery, today announced the center has been accredited as a Comprehensive Center under the Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery Accreditation and Quality Improvement Program (MBSAQIP), a joint program of the American College of Surgeons (ACS) and the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery (ASMBS).

“Being recognized as a Comprehensive Center allows the Center for Bariatric Surgery more leeway to develop individualized surgical plans to properly care for each our patients and expands the scope of patients for whom these procedures are available,” said McDermott, Good Shepherd Medical Associates General Surgeon.

The MBSAQIP Standards ensure that bariatric surgical patients receive a multidisciplinary program, not just a surgical procedure, which improves patient outcomes and long-term success.

Since opening in 2013 the Center for Bariatric Surgery has completed more than 200 procedures with additional patients in the pre-op screening or insurance qualification process. 

MBSAQIP REQUIREMENTS
After submitting an application, centers seeking MBSAQIP Accreditation undergo an extensive site visit by an experienced bariatric surgeon, who reviews the center's structure, process, and clinical outcomes data. Centers are awarded a specific designation depending on how many patients it serves annually, the type of procedures it provides, and whether it provides care for patients under age 18.

Good Shepherd Medical Center honored with quality achievement award for stroke care

Longview, Texas– Good Shepherd Medical Center (GSMC) has been awarded with the Stroke Elite Plus and Get with the Guidelines® Stroke Gold-Plus Quality Achievement Award for implementing quality improvement measures outlined by the American Heart Association (AHA)/American Stroke Association (ASA) for the treatment of stroke patients.  Only 200 Stroke Gold-Plus Quality Achievement awards were given for hospitals in the United States, and GSMC the only hospital our AHA/ASA service area to be awarded this prestigious honor.
 
2015 is the first time the Stroke Elite Plus award has been awarded. To earn this distinction, hospitals needed to demonstrate a 75 percent success rate for patients receiving tPA, the powerful clot busting drug, in less than 60 minutes from the patient’s arrival to an Emergency Department and 50 percent of patients receiving tPA in less than 45 minutes.  Good Shepherd performed significantly higher than the award criteria with 52 percent of patients receiving tPA in 45 minutes or less and 93 percent of patients receiving tPA within 60 minutes of arrival to the Emergency Department. 
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. GSMC earned the award by meeting specific quality achievement measures for the rapid diagnosis and treatment of stroke patients and has done so for 42 consecutive months.
 
“Good Shepherd Medical Center is honored to be recognized by the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association for our quality stroke care.  These awards affirm our previous recognition by CareChex and a Top 100 Hospital for Medical Excellence in Stroke Care,” said Ron Short, chief administrative officer of GSMC. “We are and will remain committed to ensuring that  patients that choose to receive care at Good Shepherd will receive care based on best-practice, internationally-accepted clinical guidelines. The Stroke Elite Plus and Get with the Guidelines helps us fulfill that commitment.”

The Joint Commission’s Gold Seal of Approval® for Advanced Certification for Total Hip and Total Knee Replacement

LONGVIEW, TX (Tuesday, September 27, 2016) – Good Shepherd Medical Center has earned The Joint Commission’s Gold Seal of Approval® for Advanced Certification for Total Hip and Total Knee Replacement.
 
The advanced certification is for Joint Commission-accredited hospitals, critical access hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers seeking to elevate the quality, consistency and safety of their services and patient care.
 
“Good Shepherd is delighted with the continued recognition of our award winning care,” said Good Shepherd Health System President and CEO Steve Altmiller. “We work hard every day to improve the lives of the communities we serve, and this certification confirms we are succeeding by identifying Good Shepherd as one of the premier facilities across the country for total hip and total knee replacements.”
 
Good Shepherd underwent a rigorous onsite review where Joint Commission experts evaluated compliance with advanced disease-specific care standards and total hip and total knee replacement requirements, including orthopedic consultation, and pre-operative, intraoperative and post-surgical orthopedic surgeon follow-up care.
 
Earlier this year, Good Shepherd was recognized as one of the top five hospitals in the state for Medical Excellence in orthopedic care by CareChex® - a division of Comparion® Medical Analytics.
 
Good Shepherd is one of the first hospitals in the nation to earn the Joint Commission’s new accreditation, which was founded in 2016 and is awarded for a two-year period.
 
The advanced certification was developed in response to the growing number of patients undergoing a total hip or total knee replacement surgery, as well as the increased focus on clinical evidence-based patient care as it relates to pain management, quality of life issues, functional limitation in mobility and the return to normal daily activities.

Wound Healing Center Recognized with National Award for Clinical Excellence

The Byron Cook, MD, Center for Advanced Wound Healing and Hyperbaric Medicine at CHRISTUS Good Shepherd Medical Center - Longview has been recognized with a national award for clinical excellence.

Longview, Texas (April 21, 2017) – The Byron Cook, MD, Center for Advanced Wound Healing and Hyperbaric Medicine at CHRISTUS Good Shepherd Medical Center - Longview has been recognized with a national award for clinical excellence. 
 
The wound healing center achieved outstanding clinical outcomes for 12 consecutive months, including patient satisfaction higher than 92 percent, and a wound healing rate of at least 91 percent in less than 31 median days. Out of 630 Centers eligible for the Center of Distinction award, 334 achieved this honor in 2017.
 
Dr. Larry Verfurth, Market Chief Medical Officer, CHRISTUS Good Shepherd Health System, said we are extremely proud of the recognition we’ve received from Healogics. The award and the statistics behind it underscore the message that our patients are receiving an extremely high level of care.

Difficult-to-heal wounds are often associated with chronic conditions like diabetes or poor circulation and can prevent people from exercising or even leaving the home. Healing wounds can have a dramatic impact on quality of life and at the same time help prevent infections that can lead to amputations.
 
Dr. Barbara Sigal, Medical Director of the wound center, said Healogics has developed algorithms that help standardize treatment of different kinds of wounds to speed up the healing process.
 
A strong staff of experienced nurses and excellent teamwork at every level drives a consistent approach to the healing process, said Sigal. "They see the same people every week and they get a very personalized type of care. The continuity of care is a big reason that patients like coming back."
 
The Byron Cook, MD, Center for Advanced Wound Healing and Hyperbaric Medicine is a member of the Healogics network of nearly 800 Centers, with access to benchmarking data and proven experience treating approximately 2.5 million chronic wounds. CHRISTUS Good Shepherd Medical Center – Longview’s wound center offers highly specialized wound care to patients suffering from diabetic ulcers, pressure ulcers, infections and other chronic wounds which have not healed in a reasonable amount of time. Some of the leading-edge treatments offered at the center include negative pressure wound therapy, debridement, application of cellular-based tissue or skin substitutes to the wound, offloading or total contact casts and hyperbaric oxygen therapy. 
 
For more information about the wound healing center, please call (903) 315-3880. 

Good Shepherd Medical Center has received the 2016 quality award rankings from CareChex® - a division of Comparion® Medical Analytics, an independent quality ratings group.

These rankings listed Good Shepherd Medical Center as #1 in the Market for Medical Excellence in Overall Hospital Care, Overall Medical Care and Overall Surgical Care.

“The release of 2016’s awards once again recognizes Good Shepherd Medical Center as a toptier hospital in the region, state and nation,” said Steve Altmiller, Good Shepherd Health System president and chief executive officer. “The fact that Good Shepherd continues to receive these high rankings from independent ratings companies, such as CareChex, demonstrates the quality care we strive to provide each day.”

Good Shepherd was ranked in the Top 100 in the Nation for Medical Excellence in the following areas:  Overall Hospital Care, Overall Medical Care, Cardiac Care, Gallbladder Removal, Gastrointestinal Hemorrhage, Heart Attack Treatment, Heart Failure Treatment, Neurological Care, Major Neurosurgery, Orthopedic Care, Pulmonary Care, Spinal Surgery, Stroke Care and Vascular Care.

Good Shepherd Medical Center (GSMC) has been presented with 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. 

Good Shepherd Medical Center (GSMC) has been presented with 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. GSMC was also awarded the Target Stroke Elite Plus designation.

GSMC met the designation’s criteria because more than 75 percent of the hospital’s stroke patients received medication within 60 minutes of arriving at the facility and more than 50 percent of the hospital’s cases received medication in fewer than 45 minutes.

Get with the Guidelines®-Stroke helps hospital teams provide the most up-to-date, researchbased guidelines with the goal of speeding recovery and reducing death and disability for stroke patients.

GSMC 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.

“Good Shepherd Medical Center continues to be recognized for its exemplary stroke care,” said Steve Altmiller, president and chief executive officer of Good Shepherd Health System. “We are committed to ensuring that our patients receive the best possible care and the Get with the Guidelines®-Stroke quality award confirms we are succeeding in that effort.”

GSMC’s staff also implemented Get with the Guidelines prevention measures, which include educating stroke patients to manage their risk factors, be aware of warning signs for stroke and take their medications properly.