Chairperson's File
Blog posts from 2025 AHA Board Chair Tina Freese Decker, president and CEO of Corewell Health, and past chairs.
In July 2013, the AHA released another collection of action-oriented resources that can help hospitals and health care systems design and implement strategies to deliver care that is safe, timely, effective, efficient, equitable and patient-centered. Hospitals in Pursuit of Excellence: A Compendium鈥
It is both 鈥渁 sprint and a marathon.鈥 That's how a team at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor, Mich., described reducing catheter-associated urinary tract infections. Along with SJMH, many hospitals and care systems are part of the sprint-marathon and using the Comprehensive Unit-鈥
Only a small percentage of patients develop a health care-associated infection after surgery, and it is estimated that about half of such infections are preventable. West Valley Medical Center, a 150-bed community hospital in Caldwell, Idaho, participates in STOP SSIs鈥擲tudy to Optimally鈥
How do you successfully integrate behavioral health and primary care? A recent HPOE webinar highlighted the work of St. Charles Health System in Bend, Oregon, to coordinate care and help develop a care transformation plan in the state. The plan's goal is to achieve the Triple Aim of improved鈥
Providing quality care for patients with limited English proficiency can be challenging, even for large health care systems. Each year Vidant Health, a regional health system serving eastern North Carolina, logs more than 24,000 distinct patient encounters with a primary language other than English鈥
The aviation industry has successfully used checklists to ensure safe air travel for passengers and crew. Now health care professionals are using checklists more frequently to provide safe care for patients. Checklists have improved processes for patient care in operating rooms, intensive care and鈥
Everyone is talking 鈥減opulation health management,鈥 and many health care organizations are successfully defining it. Cheyenne Regional Medical Center, a rural health care system headquartered in Wyoming's capital, helped establish the Cheyenne Health and Wellness Center in 2005. CHWC鈥
Here's a disheartening statistic from the National Cancer Institute: in the United States, white women have the highest incidence rate for breast cancer, but black women are most likely to die from the disease. The Gibbs Cancer Center and Research Institute at Spartanburg (South Carolina) Regional鈥
Being accessible only by airplane or boat adds to the scenic character of Wrangell, Alaska (population 2,300), but it also creates challenges for health care delivery. Wrangell Medical Center, the only hospital in the community and one of its largest employers, includes an eight-bed acute unit and鈥
June 2鈥8 is Community Health Improvement Week. The Association for Community Health Improvement sponsors the week to increase understanding of the vital role of community health improvement strategies to individual medical care and to broader population health approaches. More and more hospitals鈥