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UP Health System—Portage is one of only 10 hospitals in the Duke LifePoint network to be named a Quality Affiliate.
Hospital administration along with representatives from Duke LifePoint gave a presentation at the campus in Hancock Tuesday to celebrate the achievement.
The affiliation signifies UP Health System—Portage’s commitment to quality care and patient safety.
Hospital CEO Randy Neiswonger said it took a tremendous effort from everyone on their staff to meet the goals of the program. “This is an accomplishment that doesn’t happen overnight,” said Neiswonger. “It’s a journey and a journey that we began in 2014. It’s something that we have put a lot of the pieces of the puzzle in place to ensure that we have safe patient care, quality outcomes, and that we continuously have a culture that has evolved into something that we feel is sustainable, first and foremost, but puts our community at the forefront of everything that we do to keep our community healthy.”
The National Quality Program that healthcare systems within Duke LifePoint participate in helps each hospital to set good examples and to learn from each other.
Neiswonger said, “We have successfully separated ourselves from our peer hospitals within LifePoint health to ensure that we have the best practices in place and we lead those best practices understanding that folks will duplicate those best practices, but also, we also like to what we call ‘steal shamelessly’ from other hospitals when they have best practices so we can incorporate those best practices into our operations everyday.”
Among the presenters was Chief Medical Officer for Duke Network Services and Duke LifePoint Healthcare Dr. Harry Phillps, who said the hospital has made great strides since enrolling in the program.
“UP Health System—Portage has done remarkable work in partnership with coaches from LifePoint and from Duke,” Dr. Phillips said. “They have changed the way they deliver care to make it integral with their operations and with their culture and have achieved remarkable things in terms of improving care and improving the outcome for patients.”
By earning this Quality Affiliation, UP Health System—Portage has positioned themselves among the best hospitals in the country.
“There are only 10 hospitals that have achieved designations in LifePoint and this truly does distinguish Portage as a high performing hospital,” said Dr. Phillips. “They’ve achieved excellence to the benefit of their patients.”
Now that UP Health System—Portage has achieved the Quality Affiliation, they will be reevaluated each year so they will need to continue to improve and strive for excellence to keep the designation.
