OSHKOSH, Wis., The Society of Chest Pain Centers has granted the designation of Accredited Chest Pain Center to Aurora Medical Center, Oshkosh for receiving full accreditation from the Accreditation Review Committee. Aurora Medical Center is the 13th accredited Chest Pain Center in Wisconsin and the 266th in the nation.

The Society’s accreditation process insures centers meet or exceed quality-of-care measures in acute cardiac medicine.

Cindy Tisinai, Patient Care Director at Aurora Medical Center, says that Aurora’s recent accreditation sends a clear message to the community that we are committed to providing a high level of cardiac care. “Our Emergency Department staff quickly assesses and treats patients with chest pain to achieve the best possible outcomes – we believe this is a significant resource for our patients and the community.”

Heart attacks are the leading cause of death in the United States, with 600,000 dying annually of heart disease. More than five million Americans visit hospitals each year with chest pain. The goal of the Society of Chest Pain Centers is to significantly reduce the mortality rate of these patients by teaching the public to recognize and react to the early symptoms of a possible heart attack, reduce the time that it takes to receive treatment, and increase the accuracy and effectiveness of treatment.

The Chest Pain Center’s protocol driven and systematic approach to patient management allows physicians to reduce time to treatment during the critical early stages of a heart attack, when treatments are most effective, and to better monitor patients when it is not clear whether they are having a coronary event. Such observation helps ensure that a patient is neither sent home too early nor needlessly admitted.

“Aurora Medical Center has demonstrated its expertise and commitment to quality patient care by meeting or exceeding a wide set of stringent criteria and completing on-site evaluations by a review team from the Society of Chest Pain Centers,” says Dr. Joesph Hodgson, Medical Director of the Emergency Department at Aurora. “The ED staff here has proven beyond a doubt its professionalism and training in this medical protocol.”

Key areas in which a Chest Pain Center must demonstrate expertise include:

• Integrating the emergency department with the local emergency medical system
• Assessing, diagnosing, and treating patients quickly
• Effectively treating patients with low risk for acute coronary syndrome and no assignable cause for their symptoms
• Having a functional design that promotes optimal patient care
• Ensuring Chest Pain Center personnel competency and training
• Maintaining organizational structure and commitment
• Continually seeking to improve processes and procedures
• Supporting community outreach programs that educate the public to promptly seek medical care if they display symptoms of a possible heart attack

Aurora Health Care is a not-for-profit Wisconsin health care provider and a nationally recognized leader in efforts to improve the quality of health care. Aurora offers services at sites in more than 90 communities throughout eastern Wisconsin

About the Society of Chest Pain Centers (SCPC)
The Society of Chest Pain Centers is a patient centric non-profit international professional organization focused upon improving care for patients with acute coronary syndromes and other related maladies. Established in 1998, the Society is dedicated to patient advocacy and focusing on ischemic heart disease. Central to its mission is the question, “What is right for the patient?” In answer, the Society promotes protocol based medicine, often delivered through a Chest Pain Center model to address the diagnosis and treatment of acute coronary syndromes, heart failure, and to promote the adoption of process improvement science by healthcare providers. To best fulfill this mission, the Society of Chest Pain Centers provides accreditation to facilities striving for optimum Chest Pain Center care. SCPC is headquartered in Columbus, Ohio.