Pepper Sobieski, RN, BSN, CPHQ, has been named director of quality at Hart- ford HealthCare. She will be responsible for planning, de- veloping and executing strategies for quality and patient safety, clinical pro- cess improvement, clinical performance measurement and knowledge manage- ment initiatives throughout Hartford HealthCare. Sobieski will report to Dr. Rocco Orlan- do, chief medical officer for Hartford HealthCare, and will partner with the system quality directors, medical and nursing leadership groups and all rele- vant stakeholders across HHC. Sobieski is a 15-year veteran of Hartford Hospital who, for the last six years, has been dedicated to quality management and, most recently, was director of qual- ity for Hartford Hospital. She has managed hospital inpa- tient units, ambulatory care, in- fection control, bed management, care continuum and quality management. She has been a quality liaison to a skilled nursing facility, an H3W facilitator, and developed and coordinated a community case management program for high- risk managed Medicare patients. She recently led a major initiative to roll out a new quality data sup- port system to three of our four hospitals, which will significantly increase our ability to assess and improve quality. Sobieski is a certified professional in healthcare quality (CPHQ) and a member of the National Asso- ciation for Healthcare Quality as well as the Connecticut Associa- tion for Healthcare Quality. R x T ra A publication for the staff of Hartford Hospital February 27, 2012 Vol. 68 No. 7 Pepper Sobieski Named Director of Quality for HHC Pepper Sobieski Progress on Hudson Street Parking Garage Construction of the new employee parking garage on Hudson Street is moving along well. Crews have been aided by unusually good weather since the ground break- ing in December. You can follow the progress of the garage construction by check- ing the link on the intranet page for the Hudson Street parking ga- rage: http://intranet.harthosp.org/hh/ docs/7154?route=5566. The image is updated every 10 minutes.
Transcript
Pepper Sobieski, RN, BSN, CPHQ, has been named director of quality at Hart-ford HealthCare.
She will be responsible for planning, de-veloping and executing strategies for quality and patient safety, clinical pro-cess improvement, clinical performance measurement and knowledge manage-ment initiatives throughout Hartford HealthCare.
Sobieski will report to Dr. Rocco Orlan-do, chief medical officer for Hartford HealthCare, and will partner with the system quality directors, medical and nursing leadership groups and all rele-vant stakeholders across HHC.
Sobieski is a 15-year veteran of Hartford Hospital who, for the last six years, has been dedicated to quality management and, most recently, was director of qual-ity for Hartford Hospital.
She has managed hospital inpa-tient units, ambulatory care, in-fection control, bed management, care continuum and quality management.
She has been a quality liaison to a skilled nursing facility, an H3W facilitator, and developed and coordinated a community case management program for high-risk managed Medicare patients.
She recently led a major initiative to roll out a new quality data sup-port system to three of our four hospitals, which will significantly increase our ability to assess and improve quality.
Sobieski is a certified professional in healthcare quality (CPHQ) and a member of the National Asso-ciation for Healthcare Quality as well as the Connecticut Associa-tion for Healthcare Quality.
RxTraA publication for the staff of Hartford Hospital February 27, 2012 Vol. 68 No. 7
Pepper Sobieski Named Director of Quality for HHC
Pepper Sobieski
Progress on Hudson Street Parking Garage
Construction of the new employee parking garage on Hudson Street is moving along well.
Crews have been aided by unusually good weather since the ground break-ing in December.
You can follow the progress of the garage construction by check-ing the link on the intranet page for the Hudson Street parking ga-rage: http://intranet.harthosp.org/hh/docs/7154?route=5566. The image is updated every 10 minutes.
Hartford Hospital is the first in the region to offer patients who may not be healthy enough for open heart surgery an alter-native with the transfemoral delivery of the Edwards SAPIEN transcatheter aortic heart valve (TAVR).
On Feb. 7, Hartford Hospital’s cardiotho-racic surgeons and interventional car-diologists successfully performed two transcatheter aortic valve replacements.
This is the first non-surgical replacement of the aortic valve using the Edwards SA-PIEN transcatheter heart valve to take place in Connecticut.
“We are thrilled to be the first in the re-gion to offer the SAPIEN Transcatheter Heart Valve (THV) to our patients be-cause it offers hope to those who can-not undergo open heart surgery,” said Dr. Paul Thompson, Hartford Hospital’s di-rector of Cardiology.
The device was FDA approved in Novem-ber, becoming the first FDA-approved transcatheter device enabling aortic valve replacement without the need for open-heart surgery. It offers new hope to patients diagnosed with senile aortic valve stenosis.
The Edwards SAPIEN Valve is designed to replace a patient’s diseased native aortic valve without the need for open-heart surgery or the use of a heart-lung machine.
A team of specialists places a collaps-ible aortic heart valve into the body via a catheter that is inserted through the leg, and threaded up to the heart.
Senile aortic valve stenosis is a progres-sive, age-related disease caused by cal-cium deposits on the aortic valve. This causes the valve to narrow.
As the heart works harder to pump enough blood through the smaller valve opening, the heart eventually weakens,
The Workings of the Aortic Heart Valve
which can lead to problems such as fainting, chest pain, heart failure, ir-regular heart rhythms (arrhythmias), or cardiac arrest.
Up to 1.5 million people in the United States suffer from aortic stenosis, and approximately 250,000 of these pa-tients suffer from severe symptomatic aortic stenosis.
Severe symptomatic aortic stenosis of-ten results in debilitating symptoms that can restrict normal day-to-day ac-tivities, such as walking short distanc-es or climbing stairs.
These patients can often benefit from surgery to replace their ailing valve, but many patients are not treated be-cause they are deemed inoperable for surgery.
Patients who do not receive an aortic valve replacement have no effective, long-term treatment option to prevent or delay their disease progression.
Without treatment, severe symptom-atic aortic stenosis is life-threatening – studies indicate that 50 percent of pa-tients will not survive more than an average of two years after the onset of symptoms.
“We have found that surgery to re-place the aortic valve is an effec-tive treatment for severe senile aortic valve stenosis,” said Thompson. “But we recognize that it is not an option for everyone. This new procedure is an important option to offer our patients.
“We know it will have a significant im-pact on patient care throughout Con-necticut and beyond,” Thompson said.
If you wish to learn more about the Ed-wards SAPIEN Valve, call 860-545-1888 or visit: http://www.harthosp.org/heart.
Hartford Hospital First in Region To Offer New FDA-Approved Alternative to Open Heart Surgery New Hope for Patients Who Aren’t Strong Enough for Open Heart Surgery
Figure 1 depicts the leaflets of a healthy aortic heart valve, which open wide to allow oxygen-rich blood to flow unob-structed in one direction. The blood flows through the valve into the aorta where it then flows out to the rest of the body.
Figure 2 depicts the leaflets of a stenotic or calcified aortic valve unable to open wide, obstructing blood flow from the left ven-tricle into the aorta. The narrowed valve allows less blood to flow through and as a result, less oxygen-rich blood is pumped out to the body, which may cause symp-toms like severe shortness of breath.
Compliance Questions or
Concerns? If you need to obtain information about compliance issues or raise concerns regarding internal and regulatory practices or policies,
please contact your supervisor or call the ComplianceLine, a
confidential and toll-free service, at
1-855-HHC-OCAPor online at
HHC.OCAPComplianceLine.com
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175 Staff Members Join Walk for American Heart Association; Raise $11,508 for Cardiac Research
The affiliates of Hartford HealthCare teamed up this year to support the American Heart Association’s 2011 Heart Walk. The HH team had 175 members, and raised $11,508.40 for the American Heart Association.
The Heart Walk was held on October 29, 2011 at Bushnell Park.
The goal of the American Heart Associ-ation Heart Walk is to get people to in-crease their physical activity, while at the same time raising funds to support lifesaving research for cardiovascular diseases and stroke.
“It was so special to see the coming to-gether of so much support of our em-ployees demonstrating our efforts col-lectively in physical activity as we made strides for heart health,” said Cecilia Ko-zlowski, community relations, who was co-chair of the event. “It was a great day of fun and inspiration!”
The Cardiology administration of Hart-ford Hospital under the leadership of vice president Betsy Boatman headed up this event with HHC support.
Team captains were Darlene Sawczysyn, Ann Cios, Kate Chamberlain, Carolyn Ts-chummi, Sharon Fried, Joann Swan, Jane Klepinger, Dan Madison, Jason Suther-land, Jeanne Bodett, Jessica Pereira, Di-ane Savioli-Chase, Linda James, Margaret
Ducasse, Latifa Ali, Mi-chelle Piscottano, Kate Frank, Rafaela Ward, Michele Wright and from MidState Medical Center - Cynthia Ken-nedy and Mary Brady.
Below Left: Cheerleaders from academies inside
Hartford Public High School (nursing, engineering
and technology) joined the Hartford Hospital team
at the Heart Walk. The activity gave the girls a
chance to participate in a community activity and
learn more about heart disease.
WHO WILL IT BE?Employee of the Year to Be Announced WednesdayThe employee of the year will be an-nounced Wednesday, February 29 at noon in a special ceremony in the cafe-teria. Fourteen staff members have been selected as finalists. These individuals were all nominated by their peers and selected among all nominees by their supervisors and senior management to represent their departments.
The finalists are:• Giffty Asres, CNA, nursing• Jamie Badillo, account analyst, non gov-ernmental net revenue• Patricia Beebe, AA, cardiovascular• Gil Fortunato, business systems ana-lyst, research administration• Stephen Hanks, security officer• Greg Marsdale, security analyst, IT• Dody Masterson, RN, C8• Farris Milling, AA, medicine• Matthew Munafo, recruiter, HR• Liberty Ortiz, AA, Women’s Ambulato-ry Health• Kelly Pabilonia, social worker• James Pelletier, materials associate, ma-terial management• Robert Ross, CT scan technologist, radiology• Slavica Sisic, PCA, OPD Brownstone
The selection was made through secret ballot during a special meeting of the ex-ecutive board of the Employees’ Council The Employee of the Year winner will re-ceive a $2,000 check, recognition in the Hartford Courant, and a reserved park-ing space for one year. All finalists will receive a reserved parking space.
Free Seminar: Internet Safety for Children, WednesdayLearn about Internet threats to youth and children, such as child predators, Internet artifacts, “Sexting”, cyber bul-lies, and more at a free Lunch-n-Learn Wednesday, Feb. 29, Noon-1 p.m. in the Cafeteria Special Dining Room. Present-ed by Cyber Agent FBI, it is sponsored by Solutions Employee Assistance Program, Hartford Hospital and Connecticut Chil-dren’s Medical Center. For more info or to pre-register please call 1-800-526-3485 or 860-545-2530. Please bring your lunch.
Employees’ Council Recreation/DiscountsDid you know you can get 23% off select plans from Sprint, 20% off Jim’s Family Restaurant in Windsor, and 15% off ser-vices from Meineke Car Care Center in West Hartford, just by showing your Hart-ford Hospital badge? These are just a few of the discounts available to employees thanks to the Employees’ Council Recre-ation Committee. For a list of all available discounts, check the Employees’ Council intranet page at http://intranet.harthosp.org/hh/docs/378?route=405. The commit-tee is looking for suggestions or requests of places you would like us to explore, in-cluding trips, events, or store discounts. Email your suggestions to [email protected], or call ext. 5-3904.
Daffodil Days DeadlineDeadline to order daffodils to benefit the American Cancer Society is this Friday, March 2. Flowers will be delivered to the Cancer Center March 20. Prices range from $10 to $25. Order online at http://main.acsevents.org/goto/gray2012. For more information, contact Laura Long-ley at ext. 5-0440 or Mary Ann Vander-jagt at ext. 5-4184.
Super Colon is Coming! Every Friday in March
Join staff from The Helen & Harry Gray Cancer Center and the Gastrointestinal Division of the Department of Medicine to take a tour of an inner colon. The in-flatable Super Colon will be on display outdoors between Conklin Building and CCMC every Friday in March from 11 a.m.–2 p.m., weather permitting. Learn about colon health and how to prevent colorectal cancer. The colon replica will be staffed with nurses and health care professionals who will be available to answer questions and offer information about screening recommendations. In addition, free screening will be offered to all participants through the distribution of fecal immunochemical test kits. For more information, contact Cancer Con-nect at 860-545-6000.
Dress in Blue Day FridayThe 4th Annual National Dress In Blue Day event will be held in communities and offices nationwide on Friday, March 2 as part of Colon Cancer Awareness Month. The purpose of Dress in Blue Day is to promote awareness about colorec-tal cancer and encourage people to get screened. The Helen & Harry Gray Cancer Center and GI Endoscopy Unit, in collab-oration with the Colon Cancer Alliance and the American Cancer Society, will be participating in the Dress In Blue Day. Employees are encouraged to stop by the table that will be set up in the main lobby during lunchtime on Friday. Colon can-cer educational materials and screening resources will be offered. You may also contact Cancer Connect at ext. 5-6000 for more information regarding colorectal cancer awareness.
