As 2011 comes to a close, University Hospital and Medical Center (UHMC) today looks back on what has been a busy year full of new initiatives, industry recognitions and a new chief executive officer coming aboard.This spring, UHMC announced the appointment of Mark Rader as its new CEO. He brings more than 20 years of health care experience with 16 of those in various leadership roles with HCA. Prior to his arrival at UHMC from 2009 until moving to South Florida, he served as the CEO for Palmyra Medical Center in Albany, Georgia. Before that, he served as CEO at Pulaski Community Hospital in Pulaski, Virginia.
Rader’s passion for philanthropy and community service will have a significant presence in the community as he plans to continue to grow as a local civic and charitable leader and role model while leading the western Broward County hospital.
As a new leader took charge, UHMC also gained some national accolades for its excellent stroke care, top-rated hip and knee replacement and spine surgery programs.
The Joint Commission, the nation’s oldest and largest standards-setting and accrediting body in health care, awarded the hospital its Gold Seal of Approval™ for certification as a primary stroke center. UHMC earned the certification after undergoing an extensive on-site evaluation and demonstrating compliance with national standards for stroke care.
In addition, the commission also named the medical center’s hip and knee replacement program as gold-certified. That recognition came as a result of a rigorous on-site survey with a team of Joint Commission experts evaluating UHMC’s compliance with the highest standards of patient and family care, including infection prevention and control, leadership and medication management.
This year, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida also gave the medical center its national recognition for two of its programs: hip and knee replacement and its spine surgery program. Blue Cross Blue Shield identified both those programs as Blue Distinction Centers, which is the company’s program that singles out health care facilities demonstrating the highest level of expertise in specialized surgeries.
Those acknowledgments for specific programs culminated this fall when UHMC made The Joint Commission’s Top Performer in Quality and Safety list which includes top medical centers across the county. Only the hospitals that follow the commission’s guidelines for preventing complications, infections and errors for at least 95 percent of its patients make the list. UHMC was among only 14 percent of hospitals in the country that made the grade. Many of South Florida’s largest hospitals don’t appear on the list.
Beyond the industry acknowledgement in 2011, UHMC also opened its new University Women’s Center, which offers a renovated private waiting room with private dressing rooms; highly skilled, specially certified staff; a fully upgraded operating room; digital mammography; bone density testing and more.
While UHMC has been on a roll in 2011, it’s looking forward to building on those accomplishments in leadership, innovation and patient care in 2012.
