Highland Joins UR Pursuing Excellence Initiative

Outstanding team work leads to higher quality patient care. That’s the basis for UR Pursuing Excellence, an initiative aimed at building highly motivated, interprofessional, collaborative teams that continuously implement best practices to improve outcomes and quality measures. The goal is to transform the way providers, nurses, residents, and others work together in pursuit of clinical excellence. 

Endovascular Suite Expands Highland Vascular Surgery Capabilities

With the addition of the Endovascular Suite as part of Highland’s newly renovated Operating Rooms in the South Wing, the hospital is now providing a full gamut of vascular surgery procedures. The largest operating room at Highland, also called the Hybrid OR, is 1,100 square feet. “The room includes an advanced imaging system that enables Highland to address more diverse patient needs and offer an expanded vascular surgery service,” said Roan Glocker, M.D., M.P.H., Highland vascular surgeon.

Readmission Prevention: A Top Priority at Highland

Highland continues to pursue initiatives to prevent hospital readmissions, an important quality measure in our health care system and a key factor in determining Center for Medicare/Medicaid (CMS) reimbursement rates.

Highland has formed several committees to examine reasons for readmission within a 30-day threshold and help develop and implement solutions. The teams focus on patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and Chronic Heart Failure (CHF) diagnoses and the hospital is also part of an Accountable Health Partners (AHP) committee that examines what can be done to connect inpatient and outpatient systems to help reduce hospitalization.

Highland Physicians Lead Initiatives in Opioid Use Disorder

Highland Family Medicine (HFM) physicians Elizabeth Loomis, M.D., and Holly Russell, M.D., have committed themselves to efforts to help those addicted to opioids since their first experiences with patients during residency. Dr. Russell serves on the Monroe County Opioid Task Force and co-directs the HFM buprenorphine program with Dr. Loomis. Working collaboratively with physicians and other health care providers, community leaders, community organizations, and funders, they have spearheaded several initiatives

Expanding Our Concept of the Realm of Medicine

If you joined me in hearing Seymour Schwartz, M.D., deliver the 2018 Sischy Lecture this fall, I’m sure you were as moved as I was by his talk. “From Medicine to Manuscript, Doctors with a Literacy Legacy” profiled authors with a background in medicine, from the Middle Ages to the present era who are the focus of his book by the same name.