JCAHO clears hospital’s transplant program
The February issue of Cost Management in Cardiac Care carried a story on page 16 about Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center in Chicago. The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations in Oakbrook Terrace, IL, was scrutinizing the facility after the Wall Street Journal accorded Rush’s heart transplant unit front-page status the 15 minutes of fame no health care facility wants. Internal quality documents that were leaked to the paper disclosed that Rush staffers questioned practices concerning donor-heart matching, patient selection, and medical care.
An update on that story comes from Rush spokeswoman Denise Van, who says the Joint Commission is continuing the facility’s accreditation with no additional follow-up, and in addition, that the transplant program was found to be in full compliance with the Medicare Condition of Participation of Quality Assurance by the Health Care Financing Administration.
A more recent Wall Street Journal article states that the number of cardiac transplants at Rush has dropped significantly in recent months. The facility has established an interdisciplinary quality assurance committee to monitor the medical care given to future transplant patients. The committee is comprised of representatives from the medical and surgical sides of the transplant program.
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