The outstanding achievements in clinical care for the treatment of pneumonia patients at Cedars-Sinai have been recognized by VHA Inc., a national healthcare alliance based in Irving, TX.

Cedars-Sinai was recently presented with the 2007 VHA West Coast Performance Award for "high reliability and sustained excellence in pneumonia care" at the VHA Fall Health Care Conference held in Berkeley last month. The medical center was selected for this honor in recognition of the level of improvement seen in its quality of pneumonia treatment and accompanying outcome performance measures over a 12-month period.

"Teamwork is essential," said James Loftus, M.D., co-chair of the Emergency Department. The ED treats more than 95 percent of patients admitted with pneumonia and is responsible for initiating appropriate antibiotics for these patients within four hours.

"It takes the combined efforts of our physicians, nurses, and radiology department to make this improvement," said Dr. Loftus. "Our triage nurses are trained to order chest X-rays on appropriate patients who are waiting to be seen. The radiology department reads these films and reports back quickly so the physician can then see the patient and begin treatment. We even configured our ED computer order entry system to streamline the process by displaying a screen that has all the lab tests, X-rays and antibiotics needed to comply with the core measure."

Pictured (l-r) are ED team members Abby Ang, RN, CN III; Phil Booth, RN, CNIV; Michael Duarte, Imaging Supervisor; Shari Braun, RN, CNIV; James Loftus, M.D., and Tina Garcia, RN, CN II

"This recognition is a great honor for the entire management team and staff at Cedars-Sinai," said Zab Mosenifar, M.D., director of the Center for Chest Diseases at the Women's Guild Pulmonary Disease Institute and a leading expert in pulmonary/critical care medicine.

"We were able to become a recognized top performer because of our team's extraordinary level of performance and exemplary dedication."