Awards

American Heart Association
Recognizes FHN for Heart Attack Care

FHN Memorial Hospital has received five American Heart Association Get With The Guidelines^® achievement awards for demonstrating commitment to following up-to-date, research-based guidelines for the treatment of heart disease and stroke, ultimately leading to more lives saved, shorter recovery times and fewer readmissions to the hospital.

Every 40 seconds, someone in the U.S. has a stroke or heart attack, and heart disease and stroke are the No. 1 and No. 5 causes of death in the United States, respectively. Studies show patients can recover better when providers consistently follow treatment guidelines.

Get With The Guidelines puts the expertise of the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association to work for hospitals nationwide, helping ensure patient care is aligned with the latest evidence- and research-based guidelines.

As a participant in Get With The Guidelines programs, FHN Memorial Hospital qualified for the awards by demonstrating how their organization has committed to improving quality care.

“FHN is dedicated to improving the quality of care for our stroke patients by implementing the American Heart Association’s Get With The Guidelines initiatives,” said FHN Stroke Program Coordinator Tracy Love, MSN, RN, CNL.

“With a stroke, time lost is brain lost, and this award demonstrates our commitment to ensuring patients in our community receive care based on nationally recognized clinical guidelines.”

FHN Cardiology Clinical Nurse Leader Laura Mack, MSN, RN, CNL, HF-CERT, says the program results in better patient health: “Using GWTG helps us track and measure our performance in providing quality cardiac care. These awards are the result of collaboration between FHN clinicians and other staff to implement processes that ensure we are meeting the guidelines that lead to better outcomes for our patients.”

This year, FHN Memorial Hospital received these achievement awards:
• Get With The Guidelines^® – Heart Failure SILVER PLUS
    o Target: Heart Failure Honor Roll
    o Target: Type 2 Diabetes Honor Roll
• Get With The Guidelines® – Coronary Artery Disease NSTEMI – SILVER
    o Target: Type 2 Diabetes Honor Roll
• Get With The Guidelines^® – Coronary Artery Disease STEMI Referring Center – BRONZE
• Get With The Guidelines^® – Rural Stroke SILVER
• Get With The Guidelines^® – Rural Coronary Artery Disease STEMI BRONZE

“These awards show FHN's commitment to caring for those in their community who need cardiovascular care,” said Donald Lloyd-Jones, chair of the American Heart Association Quality Oversight Committee and chair of the Department of Preventive Medicine at Northwestern Medicine. “By following the American Heart Association’s quality improvement protocols, FHN and FHN Memorial Hospital can help realize our shared vision of improved patient outcomes, fewer readmissions and lower mortality rates – a win for health care systems, families and communities.”

About Get With The Guidelines

Get With The Guidelines^® is the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s hospital-based quality improvement program that provides hospitals with the latest research-based guidelines. Developed with the goal of saving lives and hastening recovery, Get With The Guidelines has touched the lives of more than 12 million patients since 2001. For more information, visit heart.org.

FHN Memorial Hospital received the STEMI Referring Center Silver recognition for its commitment to quality care for patients experiencing ST elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) heart attacks. FHN also received the Silver Plus Quality Achievement Awards in 2020 from the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association.

They previously received the Gold Plus Award in 2017, 2018, and 2019. The award recognizes the hospital's commitment and success in ensuring stroke patients receive the most appropriate treatment according to nationally recognized, research-based guidelines based on the latest scientific evidence.

FHN Wound Center Honored for Patient Satisfaction Achievement

The Center for Wound Healing at FHN Memorial Hospital in Freeport has earned RestorixHealth’s Clinical Distinction and Excellence in Patient Satisfaction Award.

The Excellence in Patient Satisfaction Award recognizes wound centers that have demonstrated superior performance in overall patient satisfaction.

“The Center for Wound Healing at FHN Memorial Hospital is proud to be recognized for not only its dedication to healing but also its dedication to patient satisfaction,” said Administrative Director Roland Tolliver, DPM, FACFAS. “We are proud to be the recipient of this award that recognizes the hard work and dedication of our team.”

The Center for Wound Healing, located in the FHN Specialty Care - Stephenson Street clinic at 1036 W. Stephenson Street in Freeport, offers state-of-the-art wound care treatments from advanced products and dressings to hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOt) to help patients dealing with chronic wounds. The Wound Center’s team of multidisciplinary specialists includes surgeons and podiatrists.

No referrals are needed for care at the Center for Wound Healing at FHN Memorial Hospital. For more information on the Center and the services available there, call 815-599-7410.

FHN Memorial Hospital receives an "A" from Leapfrog

FHN Memorial Hospital in Freeport has received an “A” Hospital Safety Grade from The Leapfrog Group - three times in a row. This national distinction is recognition and celebration of the hospital’s achievements in protecting hospital patients from preventable harm and errors.

“Everyone on the FHN team is part of our efforts to continually enhance the quality of care throughout the organization,” said FHN President and CEO Mark Gridley, MBA, FACHE. “Our team takes these kinds of improvements seriously, because they are caring for their own family members and friends.”

“I am so proud for the FHN team for this recognition – but not surprised, because I see the work that each member of our team does every day,” Gridley said.

FHN Clinical Quality Director Doreen Timm, MSN, RN, APN/CNS-BC agrees: “This is an excellent grade for everyone at FHN Memorial Hospital. We’re excited to see the work everyone has done pay off, and I’m proud to see our team recognized for their hard work.”

The Leapfrog Group is an independent national watchdog organization with a 10-year history of assigning letter grades to general hospitals throughout the United States, based on a hospital’s ability to prevent medical errors and harm to patients. The grading system is peer-reviewed, fully transparent, and free to the public. Hospital Safety Grade results are based on more than 30 national performance measures and are updated each fall and spring.

“This new update of Hospital Safety Grades shows that, at the national level, we saw deterioration in patient safety with the pandemic,” said Leah Binder, president and CEO of The Leapfrog Group. “But this hospital received an ‘A’ despite those challenges. I congratulate all the leaders, staff, volunteers and clinicians who together made that possible.”

To see FHN Memorial Hospital’s full grade details and to access patient tips for staying safe in the hospital, visit HospitalSafetyGrade.org.

In our most recent patient satisfaction survey of more than 3,000 people across northwest Illinois, our patients gave us an "A", too:

FHN Receives National BOLD Recognition

FHN has been recognized as a BOLD Program of Distinction awardee by the National Center for Healthcare Leadership (NCHL).

BOLD – Best Organizations for Leadership Development – honorees are chosen based on final scores and responses to the NCHL National Healthcare Leadership Survey, and include The Cleveland Clinic Foundation; The University of Texas, MD Anderson Cancer Center; and Mount Sinai Health System.

“We are in very good company,” said FHN President and CEO Mark Gridley, MBA, FACHE. “It’s typical for much larger organizations to receive this recognition, and FHN is one of the few rural healthcare organizations to receive this distinction.”

The BOLD recognition was established to point all healthcare organizations toward practices firmly grounded in sound scientific principles and best available evidence for effectiveness and to promote leadership development as critically important to healthcare organizations.

FHN was recognized for having the highest scores on leadership within the monitoring and achieving results division of the survey, an important part of any organization’s focus on continuous improvement.

“We’re very proud to have been recognized in this category,” Gridley said. “It’s a testament to how our leadership is mentored and developed to make decisions that are truly the best for our community’s health.”

2020 Business Leadership Award from the Illinois Workforce Partnership (IWP)

The IWP honors 66 companies of all sizes in the state each year for excellence in workforce services and economic development. Each of the 22 workforce development boards in Illinois selects a winner for the three categories of awards presented by the IWP. This category recognizes a private-sector company that has demonstrated leadership in the areas of workforce services and economic development and has made significant contributions to its local workforce area.

The Workforce Connection in FHN's service area (Boone, Stephenson, and Winnebago counties) selected FHN for the award because of its excellence in addressing workforce needs, especially during (and because of) a pandemic, using its incumbent worker training and developing an apprenticeship model.

This is the third time FHN has been recognized by the State of Illinois for its creativity in workforce development. Previous honors included the CNA to RN Scholarship Program and as a partner in the development of the Northwest Illinois Workforce Collaborative.

Previous awards for FHN include:

In 2014, the Fresh Inspirations Cafe at FHN Memorial Hospital was the first healthcare location in the nation to earn a Silver Certification in Sodexo's Mindful program. To achieve certification, a cafe must meet all the criteria in the category, from providing low-fat options and healthy meal combinations to labeling each cafe item with calories per serving as sold and offering a greater variety of whole and sliced fruits.

In 2013, the same organization rated FHN Memorial Hospital among the top four in the state for safety, and ranked us among the top 20 percent in the state for surgical capability.

In 2012, FHN Memorial Hospital was ranked among the top 3 hospitals in the state for safety by the world's largest, completely independent, non-profit product-and service-testing organization. This was the first time Consumer Reports rated healthcare organizations, and as you'll see below, we've been among their honorees every year since.

100 Top Hospitals^® by Thomson Healthcare - 2008
VHA Leadership Award for Clinical Excellence in Cardiac Care
Employer of Choice
Illinois Employer of the Year
Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) Leadership Award
AARP "best employers for workers over 50"
Working Mother magazine – Top 100 companies in America for working mothers
Lincoln Award for Business Excellence, Level II