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As Alice Hyde Medical Center moves into 2015, we continue to bring advanced medicine
and compassionate care to the North Country.
On the technology front
We have invested in a new, state-of-the-art General Electric (GE) 128-slice CT scanner,
which provides exceptional image quality while reducing patient radiation dose. We are
proud to be the first hospital north of Glens Falls to have this technology. The increased
number of slices generates a higher resolution 3-D image, allowing for clearer images
of patient anatomy, while using GE’s ASiR technology to help reduce the patient’s dose
of radiation. The scanner also has DoseWatch technology that allows us to monitor a
patient’s lifetime dose of radiation and determine the appropriate dose level for each
CT procedure. This new technology provides patients with the very best in imaging
capability, close to home.
Improving emergency care
We are focusing on creating the best Emergency Department in the North Country.
Taking the lead is the new Director of Emergency Medicine, Keri Gardner, MD, MPH,
FACEP. After graduating cum laude from Harvard Medical School, Dr. Gardner joined the
University of California, Los Angeles, for a four-year emergency medicine residency, a
two-year fellowship in health services and quality of care, and a master’s degree in public
health. She has spent much of her career at large academic hospitals like UCLA and
Mount Sinai. She also served as the lead physician at McMurdo Station in Antarctica.
Dr. Gardner is board-certified in emergency medicine and currently serves as the
Director of Quality and Patient Safety at NES Health, a national health care organization
specializing in creating high-performance emergency departments.
Measuring patient experience
To help us achieve the highest quality care, we have instituted new procedures to
help measure patient experience. When Dr. Gardner began working at Alice Hyde in
early 2014, she instituted a new process for gathering patient satisfaction surveys in the
Emergency Department. Previously, surveys were mailed to patients up to a month after
their visit, and oftentimes, response rates were very low. We are now using computer
tablets at the time of discharge for patients to fill out the surveys. For the entire year of
2013, we received 188 survey responses; by contrast, we received 555 survey responses
in the second quarter of 2014 alone. Not only are we receiving a higher response rate,
but we are also able to hear patient feedback in real time. This technology has been
so successful that we have expanded it to our Medical/Surgical Department and are
evaluating it for potential use in other departments as well.
Challenge and excitement
The health care industry continues to evolve, and at Alice Hyde, we are working to
meet the challenges of this new era and are excited for the possibilities that it offers.
Keri Gardner,
MD, MPH, FACEP
From the President and CEO
Mordi Rehany, MD, Chief
of Radiology, with Alice Hyde
Medical Center’s new CT scanner
Douglas F. DiVello, MPH, FACHE
President and CEO