Hospitalists & Intensivists

Hospitalists

As a patient, you may have a hospitalist assigned that will keep your personal physician informed of your treatment and progress. Our hospitalist program consists of a team of Board Certified Internal Medicine Physicians, Family Practice Physicians and Nurse Practitioners who closely monitor your care from admission to discharge.

Our hospitalist team provides state-of-the-art care 24 hours a day/365 days a year. You will find them practicing inside the medical center where they specialize in treating hospitalized patients. You and your family will be able to ask them questions about your care.

National studies show these physicians increase quality, safety and efficiency of care. CHI Health St. Elizabeth started the very first hospitalist program in the state in 1999.

Intensivists

In the St. Elizabeth Critical Care Unit a multi-disciplinary team meets in the morning and discusses every patient currently in the CCU. This is one of their patient safety initiatives.

A group of physicians, called intensivists, specialize in the critical care of hospitalized adult patients. They may consult with other physicians or completely manage your care during your stay in the critical care unit. They also work closely with your personal physician and keep them apprised, and they lead  extremely successful patient safety initiatives at St. Elizabeth.  

St. Elizabeth has been selected as a National “Mentor Hospital” by the prestigious Institute for Healthcare Safety [IHI]. They earned this honor for exceptional care of their most critically ill patients.

St. Elizabeth medical teams are excited about being invited to join the national network of mentor hospitals established by the IHI. As part of this network they will share with other hospitals across the country, the steps they take to achieve and maintain their phenomenally high levels of care which have been proven to save lives.

Patient Safety Interventions 

The IHI set in place six safety “interventions” or necessary practices for the best possible outcomes for patients. These interventions were the bedrock of their successful 18-month 100,000 Lives (Saved) campaign among 3,000 US hospitals. Since these interventions have definitively proven they save lives, more hospitals are joining in the use of these practices and the IHI is expanding its program to help save 5,000,000 lives.

Superior successes 

Among the six IHI interventions is one designed to prevent infections developing in patients with a “central Line”--a spaghetti thin medication delivery tube inserted under their collarbone. If an infection develops at this location it’s especially dangerous, since it can spread directly into the blood stream. A series of very specific, scientifically-grounded steps must ALL be accomplished to prevent infections here. In an amazing display of dedication to clinical perfection, the St. Elizabeth Critical Care Unit (CCU) team marked more than one full year--actually 390 days--without a single central line infection!

ZERO infections 

The St. Elizabeth critical Care team has also set a national record when they went an incredible 1,022 days--or nearly THREE YEARS--with ZERO ventilator-assisted pneumonia (VAP) developing, another IHI intervention, in their unit. For patients in this CCU and their families this means that the medical teams here pay attention to detail for every patient, offering them the best medical outcomes.  

Intensivists - the Gold Standard 

Teamwork in the CCU is also credited with their successes. A special group of in-house physician heads up this process and offers what is now considered a national Gold Standard of care.

They are called intensivists. They specialize in the critical care of hospitalized adult patients. They may consult with other physicians or completely manage your care during your stay in the critical care unit. They also work closely with your personal physician and keep them apprised.

Those teams include the intensivist physicians, nurses, pharmacists, respiratory therapists, physical therapists, social workers---every person who has anything to do with the patient’s medical care.

American Hospital Association Honored St. Elizabeth for Patient Safety 

For nearly THREE years--1,190 days--the St. Elizabeth critical care unit (CCU) team had ZERO infections specific to patients with ventilators to assist their breathing. Because of this phenomenal work, they were selected to be included in the American Medical Association’s book, Community Connections Ideas & Innovations!