Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter To Open Grady's New Mental Health Center

/PRNewswire/ -- Former U.S. and Georgia First Lady Rosalynn Carter is the special guest for today's opening of Grady Health System's new comprehensive outpatient mental health facility, the Auburn Avenue Recovery Center. Known worldwide for her work to improve the quality of life for those suffering from mental illness, Mrs. Carter joins health system officials in celebrating the expansion of mental health services available for adults, adolescents and children in Atlanta and the state.

Grady's Auburn Avenue Recovery Center will centralize outpatient mental health services into one convenient location. The new center expands upon the first-class mental health services already offered by Grady to provide more outpatient services in one location and help encourage clients to use the services offered. Located in the Odd Fellows Building 250 Auburn Avenue, the center features 19 individual and group treatment rooms and space for more than 50 clinical staff.

"Grady's mental health program is among the most comprehensive programs in the country," said Michael Claeys, Executive Director of Behavioral Health for Grady Health System. "We are excited to expand the services we offer for adults, adolescents and children living in Atlanta and Georgia. And we are honored that Rosalynn Carter joined us today as we cut the ribbon for our new home."

As the only 24-hour psychiatric emergency service in Georgia, Grady receives more than 15,000 patient visits a year and its psychiatric emergency service is one of the five busiest in the nation.

Grady's mental health services include:
-- Community outreach: Grady provides psychiatric services to homeless
shelters, supportive living facilities, geriatric living facilities
and other community-based programs serving patients who are unable or
unwilling to come to Grady on a regular basis to receive mental health
care.
-- Child/adolescent care: Grady provides the largest community mental
health program for disadvantaged children in Georgia and specializes
treating serious mental illness, psychological trauma, autism and
youth suicide in children ages 2 to 17. It also serves as a training
hub for more than two-thirds of the child psychiatrists in Georgia
-- Day program services: Grady provides day program services (FOCUS) for
uninsured adults with severe and persistent mental illness. This
program has earned recognition by the American Psychiatric Association
as a national award winning teaching facility.
-- Forensic Psychology: Grady provides the only forensic psychiatry
training program in Georgia and one of the first programs accredited
in the United States. Grady also provides pretrial evaluations for
Fulton County courts as well as treatment and support services in the
Atlanta City Detention Center to help reduce psychiatric emergency
visits.

-----
www.fayettefrontpage.com
Fayette Front Page
www.georgiafrontpage.com
Georgia Front Page
Follow us on Twitter:  @GAFrontPage

Grady Health System Awarded Gold from the American Stroke Association

Grady Health System announced earlier this month that it has received the American Stroke Association’s Get With The GuidelinesSM–Stroke (GWTG¬Stroke) Gold Performance Achievement Award. The award recognizes Grady’s commitment and success in implementing a higher standard of stroke care for at least 24 months according to nationally accepted standards and recommendations. Grady is situated in the heart of the stroke belt – an area in the southeastern United States that sees more strokes and stroke-related deaths than other parts of the country.

“With a stroke, time lost is brain lost, and the GWTG–Stroke Gold Performance Achievement Award addresses the important element of time,” said Dr. Michael Frankel, Grady’s Chief of Neurology and the director of the Marcus Stroke and Neuroscience Center at Grady. “Grady Health System has developed a comprehensive system for rapid diagnosis and treatment of stroke patients admitted to the emergency department. This includes always being equipped to provide brain imaging scans, having neurologists available to conduct patient evaluations and using clot-busting medications when appropriate.”

To receive the GWTG-Stroke Gold Performance Achievement Award, Grady demonstrated 85% adherence in the GWTG–Stroke key measures for 24 or more consecutive months. These include aggressive use of medications like tPA, antithrombotics, anticoagulation therapy, DVT prophylaxis, cholesterol-reducing drugs, and smoking cessation.

“The American Stroke Association commends Grady Health System for its success in implementing standards of care and protocols,” said Lee H. Schwamm, M.D., national Get With The Guidelines Steering Committee Member and director of the acute stroke services at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. “The full implementation of acute care and secondary prevention recommendations and guidelines is a critical step in saving the lives and improving outcomes of stroke patients.”

GWTG¬Stroke uses the “teachable moment,” the time soon after a patient has had a stroke, when they are most likely to listen to and follow their healthcare professionals’ guidance. Studies demonstrate that patients who are taught how to manage their risk factors while still in the hospital reduce their risk of a second heart attack or stroke. Through GWTG–¬Stroke, customized patient education materials are made available at the point of discharge, based on patients’ individual risk profiles. The take-away materials are written in an easy-to-understand format and are available in English and Spanish. In addition, the GWTG Patient Management Tool provides access to up-to-date cardiovascular and stroke science at the point of care.

“The time is right for Grady to be focused on improving the quality of stroke care by implementing GWTG¬Stroke. The number of acute ischemic stroke patients eligible for treatment is expected to grow over the next decade due to increasing stroke incidence and a large aging population,” said Frankel, also a professor of Neurology at Emory University. According to the American Stroke Association (which is a division of the American Heart Association), each year approximately 700,000 people suffer a stroke — 500,000 are first attacks and 200,000 are recurrent. Of stroke survivors, 21 percent of men and 24 percent of women die within a year, and for those aged 65 and older, the percentage is even higher.

-----
www.georgiafrontpage.com
Georgia Front Page
www.fayettefrontpage.com
Fayette Front Page
www.artsacrossgeorgia.com
Arts Across Georgia
Follow on Facebook

The Marcus Foundation Gives $20 Million to Grady Health System

/PRNewswire/ -- The Marcus Foundation today announced a $20 million gift to Grady Health System to improve emergency care to trauma and acute neurological injury victims throughout Georgia. The gift will enable Grady to expand hospital space for trauma and brain injury victims and improve time-dependent therapies for stroke and acute neurological emergencies. The new facilities will be named The Marcus Stroke & Neuroscience Center at Grady and The Marcus Trauma Center at Grady.

The project involves renovating existing hospital space to expand Grady's Trauma Center capacity from four to six dedicated trauma bays with the proper equipment, space, and resuscitation capacity to enhance life-saving patient care. Patients could then be transferred for two to ten days of care in a new 20-bed Neuro Intensive Care Unit. The funding will cover the cost of construction, equipment and recruitment of five key physicians to support the facilities.

"This gift provides us the capital to expand and modernize Grady's Trauma Center and build a new Neuro Intensive Care Unit in existing unused hospital space," said Grady President and CEO Michael Young. "These improvements will enable Grady to advance its already strong trauma care services and provide cutting-edge acute emergency care for traumatic brain injury and stroke patients. In addition to improving care, the Neuro ICU program's solid reimbursement rates should contribute greatly to Grady's ongoing fiscal sustainability."

"Grady will now be able to offer metro Atlanta a much needed 'go to' facility for neurological emergencies that operates 24 hours a day," said Bernie Marcus, chairman of the Marcus Foundation. "It is imperative to other hospitals and services throughout Atlanta and Georgia, including the Shepherd Center's Acquired Brain Injury Program and the Marcus Community Bridge Program, that Grady continues to be the leader in trauma and acute care, with the most skilled medical personnel and most updated equipment. And we hope this donation encourages others to make funding commitments to enable this facility to continue doing so much good for all those it touches."

"We have stressed for years how vital Grady is to healthcare here in metro Atlanta and across the state. I think this gift from the Marcus Foundation is recognition not only of Grady's current status but also of its remarkable potential," said A.D. "Pete" Correll, chairman of Grady Memorial Hospital Corp., which oversees Grady Health System. "Personally, I am touched by the magnitude of Bernie and Billi's gift and professionally, I look forward to seeing its impact on a team that has proven it can translate research findings to clinical outcomes."

-----
www.fayettefrontpage.com
Fayette Front Page
www.georgiafrontpage.com
Georgia Front Page
Follow us on Twitter and Facebook

Emory's Jane Fonda Center Receives Grant for Building Healthy Teen Relationships Program

The Jane Fonda Center at Emory University has been selected to receive up to a $1 million grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation aimed at reducing the nation’s unacceptable level of intimate partner violence through early prevention.

The Jane Fonda Center is one of 11 organizations in the United States receiving funding for the “Start Strong: Building Healthy Teen Relationships” four-year initiative aimed at middle school youth.

The Jane Fonda Center will collaborate with local partners, including the Teen Services Program at Grady Health System and Atlanta Public Schools (APS). The target population for the project is the nearly 10,000 students in the 6th, 7th and 8th grade in the APS. Its student population is 86 percent African American and 75 percent low income, and includes the 1,500 youth who visit the Teen Services Program at Grady annually. The initiative, which has been named locally the “Celebration” initiative, will also target parents, teachers, community groups and other teen influencers.

“Interpersonal relationship skills are not automatic; they are learned,” says Dr. Melissa Kottke, assistant professor of gynecology and obstetrics at Emory University School of Medicine and director of the Jane Fonda Center. “Our goal is to educate youth about healthy relationships in age and developmentally appropriate ways.

“By highlighting positive qualities such as self-respect and respect for others, along with effective communication skills and personal responsibility, we hope to foster an environment where teenage dating violence and abuse is not practiced and is not accepted,” says Kottke.

Kottke is the principal investigator of the national initiative at Emory.

As the nation’s largest philanthropy devoted exclusively to improving the health and health care for all Americans, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is working to discover new public health models that can not only reduce intimate partner violence among teens through intervention, but can change the attitudes and behaviors that transform social norms about intimate partner violence overall.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and its California partner, Blue Shield of California Foundation, are investing $18 million to prevent teen dating violence and abuse. With 11 sites from around the country, the “Start Strong: Building Healthy Teen Relationships” initiative will enable communities to create and evaluate comprehensive models of prevention for this serious public health issue.

“Intimate partner violence is one of our nation’s most serious public health problems,” says Dr. James Marks, senior vice president and director, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Group. “It is well past time we looked at prevention. The Jane Fonda Center at Emory is a leader in taking steps to building a coalition to end intimate partner violence. We congratulate them in their successful grant application and are eager to see the impact they and our other grantees will make for families in their communities.”

The local “Celebration” initiative includes implementing a skill-building education program for middle school students to help them better understand and manage their sexual feelings and behaviors in healthy positive ways. The project will engage older teens as educators and role models for this population. Other teen influencers such as parents, health care providers, and teachers will receive intimate partner violence training at the Jane Fonda Center and at other agencies in Atlanta.

Through partnerships with Fulton County Department of Health and Wellness, the Georgia Department of Juvenile Justice and Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, healthy relationship education will also be taught to at-risk youth and to youth who are no longer in school due to pregnancy or delinquency.

“We are honored to have been selected for this nationwide initiative,” says Marie E. Mitchell, director of programs at the Jane Fonda Center. “By working to increase positive messaging to targeted youth, reaching youth in diverse settings, and training teen mentors, teachers and parents, this community program will discourage cultural acceptance of intimate partner violence and provide the next generation of youth with a skill set to build relationships free from physical, sexual and emotional violence.”

An independent research group will conduct a national evaluation of “Start Strong: Building Healthy Teen Relationships” that will run concurrently with the program. This national evaluation team will work closely with the Family Violence Prevention Fund, one of the nation's leading organizations working to prevent domestic and sexual violence, to identify best practices from each community partnership and evaluate the program’s impact and effectiveness.

-----
www.georgiafrontpage.com
Georgia Front Page
www.fayettefrontpage.com
Fayette Front Page

Aetna Awards $50,000 to Grady Health System Foundation

BUSINESS WIRE--Aetna (NYSE: AET) announced today that it has awarded a $50,000 grant to the Henry W. Grady Health System Foundation in Atlanta.

The grant will help fund the development of D-MAP (Diabetes Management Action Plan), a computerized reminder flow sheet for Grady Health System patients being treated in the system’s diabetes clinic.

“Grady Health System is most appreciative of the support Aetna is providing for our diabetes clinic. This grant will play an important role in assisting our providers as they work to improve patient outcomes,” said Grady Health System President and CEO Pamela Stephenson.

D-MAP is used to quickly organize a snapshot of lab tests, medications and care recommendations made for each diabetes patient over the past 10 visits. Nurses at Grady Memorial Hospital can also view data from the Grady primary care clinic, which many patients also visit. This gives nurses a comprehensive picture that helps them manage patients’ care.

“Aetna is delighted to offer its support for this innovative program,” said Cynthia Follmer, president of Aetna’s Georgia market. “Effective diabetes care requires ready access to all relevant health information about each patient, and we’re excited by the potential of this program to improve the quality and the efficiency of care and deliver improved outcomes.”

Aetna provides health benefits to more than 500,000 people in Georgia.

Grady officials are confident D-MAP will lead to smoother interaction between diabetes patients and those who treat them, said Suzanne Begin Executive Director of the Henry W. Grady Health System Foundation.

“Improved communications between all providers responsible for a patient’s care will lead to better clinical decision-making, and therefore better results for the patient,” said Begin. “This project is designed to put systems in place that will improve the efficiency of Grady’s diabetes care delivery, and, at the same time, enhance patient-provider interaction.”

Founded in 1993, the Henry W. Grady Health System Foundation raises money to provide support to the critical and life saving programs at Grady Health System that are not covered by county and government dollars. To date, the foundation has supported the renovations of the Avon Breast Center, the Teen Services Center and the Jordan / Atwater Employee Wellness Center with philanthropic funds. It is an independently incorporated, nonprofit, 501(c)3 organization committed to securing additional resources to support Grady Health System and acting as fiduciary of those funds. Governed by a community-based board of directors, the foundation is comprised of civic and corporate leaders who are committed to the mission of Grady Health System and managed by nonprofit professionals who ensure the proper stewardship of each donation.

Aetna is one of the nation’s leading diversified health care benefits companies, serving approximately 37.3 million people with information and resources to help them make better informed decisions about their health care. Aetna offers a broad range of traditional and consumer-directed health insurance products and related services, including medical, pharmacy, dental, behavioral health, group life and disability plans, and medical management capabilities and health care management services for Medicaid plans. Our customers include employer groups, individuals, college students, part-time and hourly workers, health plans, governmental units, government-sponsored plans, labor groups and expatriates.

FDA Funds Emory-Led Critical Care Lung Research at Grady Hospital

A new study funded by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is underway by Emory physicians at Grady Memorial Hospital to find an effective treatment for patients with acute lung injury.

Lead study investigator Greg S. Martin, MD, says despite less than 200,000 reported cases each year, "acute lung injury is not an uncommon disease for critically ill patients. Every published study notes that between 10 and 25 percent of critically ill patients have this disease, and it's something we see frequently in the ICU." Martin is assistant professor of medicine (pulmonary, allergy and critical care medicine) in Emory University School of Medicine,

Acute lung injury (ALI) and acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) are inflammatory disorders of the lung most commonly caused by sepsis, pneumonia, trauma and/or aspiration.

"These disorders can elicit an immune response that creates such an exaggerated amount of inflammation that the lung becomes injured," says Martin. "When the lung becomes injured it doesn’t work properly and gas exchange doesn’t occur normally. People with this severe form of lung injury end up on a respirator and there is no real treatment."

Previous clinical trials have shown that combination colloid and diuretic therapy greatly improves oxygenation and fluid balance in ALI/ARDS patients without compromising their cardiovascular stability.

In this study, Martin and his team will follow 60 patients, comparing two drug combinations that have not previously been assessed. In a randomized, double-blind, controlled design, 30 patients will receive continuous infusion furosemide with 5 percent albumin and 30 patients will receive 6 percent hetastarch. The treatment will last for five days and patients will be assessed during and afterwards for improvements in lung function and dependence on the mechanical respirator.

Martin says these specific drug combinations were chosen because they are very complementary. Studying their interactions will give researchers a better understanding of the biochemistry and physiology of the disease.

“These drugs should help to resorb some of the excess fluid in the lung from ALI/ARDS as well as improve some of the inflammation and other stress that the body withstands, and thus improve gas exchange from the lung," he says. "If we’re right about some of the preliminary data, this treatment could reduce the length of time on the ventilator."

In ALI the lung is injured and develops a thick fluid that accumulates in the lungs and causes swelling or edema. Current strategies attempt to remove that edema or block the inflammation that causes the edema.

Treatment includes mechanical ventilation, supportive care and treatment of underlying causes, but Martin notes, “Studies of ALI or ARDS over the past 30 years have all failed to find anything that is directly effective. At Emory we’ve been working for a number of years on strategies that help prevent the accumulation of edema to start with and affect the way fluid might be removed more quickly."

According to Martin, the mortality rate for patients with ALI and ARDS is approximately 40 percent. Those who survive usually are on a ventilator for several weeks, often resulting in severe consequences, including weakness, brain impairment and reduced quality of life.

“ALI is a relatively common condition in the ICU for which there is no treatment," says Martin. "We’re hoping to find something that will get people off the ventilator sooner and perhaps improve their outcome. Unfortunately, individuals must be critically ill to be eligible for this study – they cannot volunteer on their own. However, it is important for people to know that Emory University and Grady Memorial Hospital are working hard on something that really can make a difference for these patients.”

Martin treats patients in both pulmonary and critical care medicine at Grady Memorial Hospital, Emory Crawford Long Hospital and Emory University Hospital. He also trains fellows in pulmonary and critical care medicine and directs the Medical and Coronary Intensive Care Units at Grady Memorial Hospital.

Grady Health System Selects MedAssets for Financial Improvement Initiatives

BUSINESS WIRE--MedAssets, Inc. (NASDAQ: MDAS) announced today (May 13, 2008) that Grady Health System in Atlanta, GA signed an agreement for its complete platform of supply chain management solutions. The agreement is effective January 2008.

Grady Health System includes a 953-bed facility located in downtown Atlanta, a rehabilitation center, and nine neighborhood clinics. Grady is an internationally recognized teaching hospital and operates a nationally recognized Emergency Care Center and Burn Unit, including a Level One Trauma Center. Grady has nearly 5,000 employees and manages almost 800,000 patient visits each year.

MedAssets will provide its supply chain management platform consisting of group purchasing services, medical device cost management, supply chain data cleansing and management, a customized contract catalog for managing purchase transactions, and analytical software for controlling supplies and pharmaceutical expense.

“Grady currently needs bottom line results, and MedAssets delivers financial improvement,” stated Pam Stephenson, chairperson of Grady Health System board of directors and health system chief executive officer. “The unique and customized solution offered to us and a proven track record to deliver on financial commitments was the foundation for our decision to move to MedAssets.”

John Bardis, chairman, president, and chief executive officer, MedAssets, Inc. stated, “We are delighted to be chosen by Grady Health System to help them reduce cost of supplies and provide helpful tools to their supply chain management team. Based in metro Atlanta ourselves, it is important to MedAssets to help Grady stay financially healthy. Grady’s RFP process was very thorough, open and objective. Grady chose MedAssets for supply cost management and GPO services because the superior financial results we can deliver are in line with their stated goals. Many other healthcare providers are choosing MedAssets and exiting long time relationships with their former GPO for the same reason.”