"On behalf of all of us at Meriter Hospital, many thanks for your encouragement and support. We thoroughly enjoyed our review with Scott Soronen and Dr. Ezra Amsterdam. They had many things to offer and suggest which will help launch the next steps to process improvement.

It just happens to be a JCAHO Spring for us so this will also be a Process Improvement example we use to demonstrate the multi-disciplinary work done that has excellent patient care outcomes, results. This is an effort that my vice president describes as "a case study in 'agility' that the entire organization can learn from."

Sherry Quamme
Director Emergency Services
Meriter Hospital

"We at Saint Francis Hospital find the Chest Pain Center accreditation extremely precise. The criticism was very valid and constructive and certainly we were able to use it to improve our process. When an organization is faced with any accreditation process, the environment becomes chaotic. We were glad that the Society's site surveyors were relaxed and with their expertise and our expertise, this chaotic process became very harmonic. We wanted to and we are proud to be the first chest pain center accredited in the state of Illinois."

Shahriar Dadkhah, MD
Director of Cardiology Research
Saint Francis Hospital

“There has been no true standardization and in some instances the ‘Chest Pain Center’ is unfortunately a sign at the door used as an advertising tool. The fact that the society has provided standardization, will benefit the majority who seriously want to positively impact management of heart attack patients with their Chest Pain Center to save lives, improve patient outcomes, and establish an overall community strategy for cardiac care."

Ahmed El Ghamry Sabe, MD
Executive Director, Cardiovascular Center
Mercy Medical Center

"We had a very good experience with the Chest Pain Center accreditation. We all feared the process to be somewhat like a JCAHO review but found it to be much different. There was a spirit of process improvement and collaboration which put everyone at ease. They were very helpful by giving suggestions to make improvements yet complimenting what we had already achieved. All in all, it was very pleasant."

Kate Higgins, RN, BSN
Cardiovascular Champion
West Houston Medical Center

“From my perceptive, the accreditation was very, very meaningful. We have committed ourselves to having a world-class cardiovascular program and a major component of that is meeting a nationally established set of criteria. It demonstrates to the physicians in our program, that the board is willing to go to what ever lengths is necessary to support that effort. It demonstrates to the community that our commitment and dedication is there and that they will get the best care possible.”

Thomas E. Cecconi
President and CEO
Mercy Medical Center