The good news out of Palo Pinto General Hospital is that numbers of flu patients visiting the emergency room are down from a high on Oct. 18.

Along with legislative updates, the current audit, and monthly reports, discussion at Tuesday’s PPGH board meeting kicked off with H1N1 and the hospital’s stock of disaster-related medical supplies.

CEO Harris Brooks said there are two things hospitals know about disasters, “You can’t prepare enough for a disaster and no two disasters are the same.”

Brooks later said there is no word on the H1N1 vaccine for PPGH, although the hospital ordered doses for the Bridge to Health Mobile Clinic, the Gordon Clinic, the hospital pharmacy and for staff – those treating the illness.

“The Sunday before last [Oct. 18] was the busiest seen in a 24-hour period in the emergency room,” he said, adding that this could be a sign that PPGH has seen its peak in flu-related illness, at least for this round.



Measuring quality

Quality and Risk Management Director Brenda Patton presented a quality report based on the Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems hospital survey. Developed by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services with the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality the survey measures patient’s experiences and satisfaction with hospitals.

Patton explained that the hospital survey goals include: producing comparable data on patient’s perspectives of care at hospitals nationwide; creating incentives for hospitals to improve their quality of care; and enhancing hospital’s accountability to the public by increasing transparency.

She said hospitals started reporting on a voluntary basis in October 2006. Beginning July 2007 CMS required reporting by hospitals subject to Inpatient Prospective Payment Systems provisions.

“In 2008, hospitals that failed to report received a 2 percent cut,” said Patton.

PPGH contracts with Jay Morgan and Associates to conduct the survey, which is largely based on patient interviews.

It asks previous PPGH patients about topics like nurse and physician communication, cleanliness and quiet conditions of the hospital’s environment, responsiveness of staff, pain management, communication regarding medication and recommendation of hospital to family and friends.

The results are scored on a five-point scale. In each category, PPGH “consistently scored in the three to four range,” Patton said, based on a five-point scale. “We consistently score higher than average for all hospitals reporting in the U.S. and Texas because we are small and can address issues and complaints better.”

Besides being required, Patton said survey results give PPGH some helpful feedback.

“We get patient’s comments from Jay Morgan and give those back to departments,” she said. “It’s good information for us to use.”

She said survey results are available on participating hospitals through the CMS Web site.

In other business, Brooks reported on new physician recruitment. He said PPGH has contracts with two new hospitalists, Dr. Robbie Knight, from Austin, and Dr. Sandra Peyton, from Keller, Texas. The two will replace Drs. Jose Gomez and My Myers. He added that he is still looking for a third to replace Dr. Gustavo Del Toro, who will leave PPGH at the end of November. Brooks said that both Gomez and Del Toro were unable to sell their respective homes where they previously practiced and plan to return.

In addition to needing one more hospitalist, Brooks said he is recruiting and screening obstetrics/gynecology candidates.

Dr. Ravi Pachigolla is the newest ear, nose and throat physician and will begin renting the visiting physician’s clinic in January, practicing locally on Wednesdays.

In other business, Brooks reported on the following:

• PPGH Auxiliary Awards Banquet last week honored volunteers and had 24 service award recipients, including Rosemary Miller, who has contributed 13,500 hours over her career, and Sally Pruitt, who has racked up 19,000 hours of service.

In 2009, the auxiliary contributed over $60,610 that they gave back to PPGH by buying such things as televisions and furniture, according to Brooks.

• PPGH is in the process of going out for bids for EMS transportation services providers. He said he expects to have four bidders, including current provider Guardian EMS.

“We will want to see what resources they will bring to the table and to this community,” Brooks said. He added that when Guardian was stationed in Mineral Wells, their response time was great, but things changed when they moved to Weatherford.

He said, more than costs, PPGH will want to know, “What is your response time if we need a second truck?”

An example of community need came Tuesday afternoon, when there were two simultaneous EMS calls. At the same time both Mineral Wells Fire/EMS Department trucks were called to a two-vehicle wreck, Mineral Wells Volunteer Fire Department was called a home.

According to MWFD dispatch, this happens rarely, but when Guardian EMS was stationed locally, dispatch would call them to respond when Mineral Wells needed extra help with emergencies.

• He has been recruiting a new plant operations director to replace Wilburn Knowles, who recently retired.

• An initiative called “door to balloon” has improved the time between when a segment elevation myocardial infarction [heart attack] patient enters the PPGH hospital emergency room and when they receive a “balloon” in the artery in the cath lab.

According to the American Heart Association the goal of this initiative is to achieve a door-to-balloon time of less than 90 minutes for 75 percent of non-transfer patients needing percutaneous coronary intervention (previously called angioplasty).

Brooks said their new record time is 75 minutes.

“It is actually faster to get treated here than at Plaza,” he told board members.