FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 23, 2008

St. John’s Mercy Hospital Recognized for
Best Surgical Practices

Primaris has recognized the Surgery Department at St. John’s Mercy Hospital for best practices in the area of improving surgical care. For the past three years, St. John’s Mercy Hospital has been working with Primaris (formerly known as Missouri Pro) on its Surgical Care Improvement Project (SCIP). Primaris recently thanked SJMH for its participation and commended the Hospital for its success in this area.

The hospitals in the Primaris project made great improvements: the use of prolonged ineffective use of antibiotics following surgery was reduced by 34 percentage points (from 50 to 14 percent) and safer methods of hair removal before surgery increased by 19 points (from 65 to 84 percent), which allowed undamaged skin to play a significant role as a barrier to surgical infections. SJMH was particularly noted for its improvement in the discontinuation of antibiotics 24 hours after surgery and VTE (venous thrombus emboli – blood clot prevention) ordering and delivery. Primaris asked SJMH to share its best practices with other hospitals.

St. John’s Mercy Hospital has always been proactive by being involved in any collaborative that improves patient care. The Hospital participated in Missouri Pro (now Primaris) six years ago and was one of the initial hospitals involved in its Surgical Infection Prevention (SIP) collaborative. Now, SJMH is involved in the SCIP collaborative. The surgical team is always interested in providing the best evidence-based care.

The care is consistent and a best practice for each type of surgery. SJMH’s infection rate has always been low; a decrease in infections was shown in 2007. The goal is to prevent any infection for all patients at SJMH.

What was the most critical to SJMH’s success?

• Collaboration between physicians and the Operating Room team

• Education provided to implement evidence-based medicine in the Operating Room

• Leadership’s participation, which was extremely important throughout the process

• Supplies and equipment purchased to standardize processes.

The surgical services team at St. John’s Mercy was honored to be chosen as a best practice. The surgical services team works very hard to provide the best, safest and evidence-based practice in its care. The surgical services team is open to change and is willing to implement practices that will benefit its patients.

  St. John’s Mercy Hospital is a member of the Sisters of Mercy Health System.