West Valley Medical Center - January 02, 2017
Betsy Hunsicker

Betsy Hunsicker
CEO

As we enter into a new year, it’s time to look back on our accomplishments from 2016 … there is a lot to be proud of and none of this would have been possible without each and every one of you.

Survey Success

We had pretty much every survey known to man in 2016 and we passed each one with flying colors! The Joint Commission, CMS, Waste Management, FDA, HCA Quality Review System, and so on and so on!

Quality & Patient Safety

We continue to elevate the quality of care we are providing to our patients. We maintained our Truven Health Analytics Top 100 Hospitals award, expanded our Healthgrades awards to additional service lines, maintained our Leapfrog “A” Patient Safety score and Get with the Guidelines Heart Failure Gold Plus, and we were recognized in Becker’s Hospital Review as “100 Greatest Community Hospitals”. We achieved distinction in 2016 as the only hospital in Idaho with Heart Care Accreditation in the treatment of Chest Pain, Atrial Fibrillation, and Heart Failure from the Society of Cardiovascular Care. Thank you for your continued focus on patient safety and diligence in delivering high-quality care, we couldn’t achieve recognition like this without your commitment in putting out patients first.

Construction & Equipment Projects Completed

  • Day Surgery and PACU are in their new space – next to come is new and updated ORs and Sterile process…
  • Staff Locker Rooms complete and exercise equipment is in place for our employees to use for a healthier work environment.
  • New MRI and permanent home! The magnet is high tech with a large bore and the room it’s in is incredible. We are finally able to provide a modern and comfortable environment for our patients with state of the art imaging!
  • ED Floor – it looks fantastic!
  • Housewide monitoring system is up and running!

Service Line Accomplishments

  • Cardiology took off this year adding coronary interventions and more recently peripheral interventions to our EP program! It is so impactful to be able to provide this type of care at West Valley and to keep families closer to home!
  • Our ED has stabilized and we have some great providers who have joined our West Valley family. We have made huge progress with our ED throughput metrics – from greet times to lab times to admission hold times – which has been a great effort by a lot of people both in the ED and outside of the ED.
  • We successfully launched the ECT program with Drs. Saccomando and Montgomery – at the ISC and here at the hospital. We are the only hospital providing this service in Idaho and it has been life changing for these patients.
  • The next phase of the OR expansion can’t come soon enough, our growth in surgical volumes in Ortho/Spine and Urology have surpassed benchmarks again in 2016.
  • We had growth in OB services this year and added Dr. Hunter (OB) and Dr. Baldwin (FP w/OB).
  • New physicians in addition to those above for 2016 – Dr. Glover (spine), Dr. Bradley (spine), Dr. Payvar (Cardiology), and although he came in 2015, Dr. Wolf (Ortho) has been a great addition in expanding Orthopedic services.

Still to Come...

  • OR Expansion continues! Phase 1 of Phase 2 begins February 6.
  • NICU – it’s really happening! Construction will begin in February and provider credentialing is underway!
  • Pharmacy remodel – Construction will begin in February to meet new regulations for IV mix and chemo rooms.
  • Pharmacy staffing – we set out in 2016 with the goal to expand to 24/7 pharmacy. This has been challenging because within HCA most hospitals of our size do not have 24/7 pharmacies. We continue to try to be creative with how we are providing services so that we can expand hours of service and eventually get to the 24/7 goal.
  • Strategic Priorities for 2017: We will continue to focus on meeting the needs of our local community by looking at services that typically transfer out of our facility in an effort to keep more of our patients closer to their homes and support system. We are developing proposals for growth in our emergency department, behavioral health, neonatal, and cardiovascular services for 2017.

So all in all a pretty good year. Thank you for what you do every day to help us be successful. There is still lots to do and we will continue to work tirelessly to make West Valley a place where you are proud to practice and our patients receive the highest level of care. Happy New Year! May 2017 bring health and happiness to you and yours.

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