Bariatric Midtown team wins Georgia Hospital Association PHA Patient Safety & Quality Award second year in a row
JANUARY 2022
A team of Emory bariatric clinicians led by metabolic and bariatric coordinator Melissa Majumdar, MS, RD, CSOWM, LDN, and general and GI surgeon Elizabeth Hechenbleikner, MD, received 1st place in the Georgia Hospital Association (GHA) Partnership for Health and Accountability's (PHA) 2022 Patient Safety & Quality Awards. The team represented Emory University Hospital Midtown and was included in the category of hospitals with greater than 300 beds.
These annual awards recognize Georgia health care organizations for achievement in reducing the risk of medical errors and improving patient safety and medical outcomes.
"We won the award last year as well, and we're very excited," says Dr. Hechenbleikner. "Plus the work recognized by the award was successful in reducing postoperative emergency department visits following bariatric surgery in the process."
The team's study was entitled "Implementation of a Postoperative Bariatric Surgery Phone Call Intervention to Reduce Emergency Department Visits." Co-authors included Edward Lin, DO, MBA, chief of the Division of General and GI Surgery; Zachary Grunewald, PhD, MS, RDN, LD, metabolic and bariatric coordinator at Emory Johns Creek Hospital; Varnette Robinson, MS, RN, metabolic and bariatric surgery clinical reviewer; bariatric surgeons S. Scott Davis, MD, Jahnavi Srinivasan, MD, Jamil Stetler, MD, Federico Serrot, MD, Ankit Patel, MD, and Maggie Diller, MD; and Emory Bariatric Center physician assistants Colin Johnson and Huda Hayyeh.
The project focused on postoperative emergency department (ED) visits after bariatric surgery, which are common and potentially preventable. Outpatient care coordination phone calls have been shown to improve outcomes across several surgical specialties, but have not been well described among bariatric patients. The team's initiative evaluated the impact of a structured postoperative phone call after bariatric surgery on the incidence of 30-day ED visits with an ultimate goal of reducing these visits to less than 5%.
Postoperative calls were administered within one week of bariatric surgery by the metabolic and bariatric surgery coordinator using a structured 10-question template for common postoperative issues. These calls and the detailed tracking of complications helped identify targeted interventions within a clinical escalation pathway to address a variety of issues including dehydration, oral intake, and constipation. The team exceeded their project goal, with average monthly ED visits decreasing from 7.4% to 3.8% after initiation of the standardized phone call intervention.
About PHA
The Partnership for Health and Accountability (PHA), an affiliate of the Georgia Hospital Association (GHA), was established in January 2000 to improve patient care and patient safety in hospitals and other health care facilities and create healthy communities.
About GHA
Founded in 1929, GHA serves more than 150 hospitals in Georgia and promotes the health and welfare of the public through the development of better hospital care for all Georgia's citizens. The mission of GHA is to advance the health of individuals and communities by serving as the leading advocate for all Georgia hospitals and health care systems. GHA represents its members before the General Assembly and Congress, as well as state and federal regulatory agencies, and is an allied member of the American Hospital Association.