INDIANAPOLIS
– Staff from local extended care facilities and home health agencies will hone
their skills in caring for patients with heart failure at a May 9 seminar
sponsored by Franciscan St. Francis Heart Center and St. Francis Medical Group
Indiana Heart Physicians (IHP).
Heart Failure Care:
We’re in it Together
gets under way at 8 a.m. in the basement auditorium at the Heart Center (8111
S. Emerson Av.) Nearly 130 health
professionals, including representatives from extended care facilities, home
health agencies and other local hospitals, are registered to attend.
Led
by Polly Moore, M.D., an IHP cardiologist and co-director of the Franciscan St.
Francis Heart Failure Care Clinic, topics will include the signs, symptoms and
care for heart failure; nutritional concerns; patients’ experiences at the hospital;
medications for heart failure, and end-of-life issues.
“The
education is directed toward care providers from all areas so they can better
understand their role in caring for patients after they are discharged from
hospitals,” said Moore. “In virtually all areas of heart care, communication is
the key.”
Promoting care coordination and communication across
providers has been a major focus at Franciscan St. Francis Health. Earlier this
year, Franciscan Alliance announced it had become Indiana’s first and only Accountable
Care Organization (ACO). The Franciscan Alliance ACO works on similar
initiatives to promote better health for Medicare patients, using increased
communication, education, and information-sharing among healthcare providers.
Heart failure is a leading cause of
morbidity and mortality in the United States with heart failure patients
responsible for 12 to 15 million physician office visits per year and 6.5
million hospital days.
The Franciscan St. Francis Heart
Center received a three-year full Heart Failure Accreditation status from the
Society of Chest Pain Centers (SCPC) in 2011. The Heart Center demonstrated
expertise and commitment to quality patient care by meeting or exceeding a wide
set of stringent criteria and undergoing an onsite review by a team of SCPC’s
accreditation review specialists.
Franciscan St. Franci
Health-Indianapolis was ranked No. 1 in Indiana for Overall Cardiac Services;
awarded five stars for Heart Failure Care (2008-12); and received five starts
for Heart Valve Repair and Replacement Surgery by HealthGrades in 2012.
Hospital
surgeons treat the most complex cases, using the latest devices and
participating in cutting-edge research. Franciscan St. Francis Heart Center was
the first hospital in America to
use innovative next
generation valve technology during surgery.
To
learn more about services at Franciscan St. Francis Heart Center, go to www.myheartcare.net.
