SSH receives award

By Staff Reports

   Expressing condolences in customer service and quality performance, State Sen. Rusty Crowe on Thursday presented Sycamore Shoals Hospital with a Senate resolution commending the hospital's receiving of the Tennessee Center for Performance Excellence Quality Achievement Award.
   Crowe said, "We're really proud that the state of Tennessee has presented this Quality Award to Mountain States Health Alliance (MSHA) and Sycamore Shoals Hospital."
   To honor the great effort and hard work shown by SSH CEO Scott Williams along with the dedicated hospital staff, Crowe and officers of the State Health Committee, said the Senate and House have passed legislation.
   "All of that hard work has paid off and we appreciate it. It makes East Tennessee look good," Crowe said. "It's always nice when we see good things happening in our hospitals at home. Mountain States has made an effort to not just improve, but become the best at what it does. It's good for the patients right here at home and we hear it from them a lot."
   Company officials said receiving the award the first time MSHA applied for it says a great deal about the health care system, its physicians, team members and volunteers.
   " I think its a real honor to achieve this quality award," said SSH CEO and MSHA Vice President, Scott Williams. "We worked really hard to make improvements for our community and that's what it's all about. It's not so much getting the award; it's making improvements for our community so it can be better served."
   The TNCPE Award is an annual statewide program that honors organizations which exemplify the highest standards of excellence through their practices and achievements. The program uses the "Criteria for Performance Excellence" established by the Malcom Baldridge National Quality Program as the evaluation tool.
   Quality Achievement is the third level of achievement in the four-tiered TNCPE Awards program. Only the TNCPE Excellence Award represents a higher level of performance excellence.
   MSHA participated in an onerous TNCPE examination process to qualify for the award. After completing a 50-page application, the organization then hosted a team of TNCPE examiners for a three-day site visit last fall.
   The examiners strategically graded the healthcare system's leadership structure, planning processes, customer and market focus, information processes, staff focus, process management and organizational performance results.
   The Tennessee Center for Performance, known as the Tennessee Quality Award program, presented only eight organizations with the Quality Achievement Award this year. Mountain States Health Alliance was only one of two health care organizations in Tennessee receiving the Quality Award this year.