Telling the Hospital Story

Patients and communities rely on the wide range of critical health care services that only hospitals and health systems can provide, including 24/7 emergency and other higher-acuity care. Hospitals also work with their community partners to develop and deploy programs that advance health and wellness. 

Hospitals and health care workers have stood strong for their communities, and they have a vital role in our society to keep communities healthy.

AHA has created an online toolkit to help hospitals and health systems tell their story.


The AHA this week started running digital billboard ads at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport highlighting the important role that hospitals and health systems play in their communities.

The AHA is running digital billboard ads at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport highlighting the important role that hospitals and health systems play in their communities.


Want to get involved and protect patient care? Join the Coalition to Protect America’s Health Care and commit to protect care for all Americans.

GET INVOLVED

  • Share your stories via this form so AHA can elevate the work you do.
  • Identify a hospital ambassador: Sign up here via this form to join AHA’s efforts through op-eds, audio news releases and other AHA-supported media opportunities.

Featured Resources

Learn how the Coalition to Protect America’s Health Care is fighting for hospitals so they can preserve access to care.

Setting the Record Straight

On important issues that affect hospitals, health systems and patients.

 

AHA Members Only Resources

View key AHA member-only advisories and resources that illustrate the crucial role hospitals and health systems play in their communities.

Find Resources

 

Tell us how hospitals have provided care and supported health in your community throughout the pandemic.

Share Your Hospital Story



Spotlight on Hospitals

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

University of Vermont Health Network. UVM Medical Center facility against a blue sky

Like other rural health systems, the University of Vermont Health Network is still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic and facing unprecedented challenges like high demand for care, severe staffing shortages and increasing costs. In response, the health system is focusing on four strategic pillars to guide its work: Experience; Education and Research Mission; Stewardship; and Operational Excellence.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Northern Light. Stock photo of clinician measuring pregnant patient's blood pressure.

The birthing centers at Maine’s Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center, Inland Hospital and Mercy Hospital in 2023 received recognition at the state’s Perinatal Quality Collaborative conference for their work addressing maternal hypertension.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Kent Hospital. Hospital at Home team examines Russell on his house boat

The Kent Hospital at Home (HaH) care team, based in Warwick, R.I., visits the homes of qualifying patients, whether they live in a house, apartment, skilled nursing facility — or even a boat.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

West Virginia University Medicine. WVU Medicine facility exterior shot

What happens when a patient is well enough to leave the hospital, but there’s no home to return to? WVU Medicine United Hospital Health Center is addressing this issue by partnering with the United Way of Harrison and Doddridge Counties to establish the first medical respite care center in the state of West Virginia.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Loma Linda University Medical Center - Female LLUMC clinician stands and reviews a tablet with a female ER patient in hospital gown

Thanks to a $1.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Loma Linda University Medical Center (LLUMC) will now house within their emergency department a comprehensive behavioral health program, as well as an HIV prevention and care program.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Indiana University Health - IU photo of clinician measuring black male patient's blood pressure at a barbershop event

IU Health recently began a new community health initiative to provide prevention, education and early detection of cardiovascular disease — which includes free blood pressure screenings — in area barbershops.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Northwell Health. Three male chefs in Northwell's kitchen gather around a large stock pot

Hospital food has long shared the same unfortunate space with airline food as the source of comedic punchlines, but more importantly, as a major source of customer and patient dissatisfaction. No longer, at least not at Northwell Health, New York State's largest healthcare provider and private employer.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Vanderbilt University Medical Center - Stock photo of female clinician swabbing female patient's neck

Rural hospitals across the country face obstacles when it comes to providing access to care to the population they serve – and continually come up with innovative solutions to ensure their patients receive the services they need. Thanks to a federal grant, Vanderbilt University Medical Center is aiming to provide care for women at one of the darkest times in their lives.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Houlton Regional Hospital - American College of Emergency Physicians Accredited Geriatric Emergency Department badge

Houlton (Maine) Regional Hospital has received a level 3 Geriatric Emergency Department Accreditation, the bronze standard, for delivering excellent care for older adults in its emergency department.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Sanford Bemidji Medical Center - Dr. Tina Pattara Lau

In this conversation, Tina Pattara-Lau, M.D., maternal and child health consultant with the Indian Health Service Office of Clinical and Preventive Services, and Johnna Nynas, M.D. obstetrics and gynecology specialist at Sanford Bemidji Medical Center, explore common disparities and systemic barriers Indigenous people experience in pregnancy and postpartum, and ways hospitals and health care organizations can combat these challenges to provide culturally-focused care.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Allen Twigg, Meritus Health

The Carolyn Boone Lewis Equity of Care Award 2023 Transforming Winner, Meritus Health, was honored for creating and implementing strategies that influence equity within its community. In this conversation, Allen Twigg, Meritus Health's executive director of behavioral and community health services, talks about their role in the community and how they have expanded that role to reduce disparities for the population.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Sandra Ogunremi, Monument Health

The Carolyn Boone Lewis Equity of Care Award 2023 Rural Winner, Monument Health, was honored for their journey in health equity progress that has spanned over eight years. In this conversation, Monument Health’s Paulette Davidson, president and CEO, and Sandra Ogunremi, DHA, vice president of diversity, inclusion and belonging, discuss how one incident made the rural health system vow to do better and commit to a strong path forward in health care equity.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital. Franck Nelson

Carolyn Boone Lewis Equity of Care Award 2023 Emerging Winner, Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital (RWJUH), was honored for its passion and progress in advancing health equity. In this conversation, Franck Nelson, assistant vice president of health equity, discusses the steps the organization has taken to dismantle equity barriers in its care delivery system and the community it serves.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

The AHA’s prestigious Foster G. McGaw Prize honors health delivery organizations that have demonstrated a strategic approach to community health and health equity.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Children's Hospital Michigan's brightly colored exterior

A new pediatric heart clinic in Troy, Mich., opened by Children's Hospital of Michigan, is handling pre- and post-surgical appointments for area patients, relieving them from much longer commutes to Detroit, where heart surgeries will continue at its main campus.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

BMC Operation Better Start staff

Berkshire Medical Center’s Operation Better Start is a collaborative effort among health care providers to help young people and their families make and sustain positive changes in their health.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Inagural LCMC Minority Adminstrative Fellowship class

New Orleans-based LCMC Health in early 2023 announced its inaugural Minority Administrative Fellowship Program, an initiative that aims to diversify the health care executive workforce.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

A bald-shaven paramedic kneels in a patient's living room, checking her blood pressure

Paramedics in a mobile medical unit from Henry Ford Health are visiting new mothers at home to check their vitals as part of an initiative to help reduce pregnancy-related deaths across Michigan.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Stock photo of a black physician smiling and examining a black toddler sitting on his mother's lap

The University of Kansas Medical Center announced on June 6 the launch of the Center for African American Health.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Short stay room includes a patient bed and a visitor chair

In April, the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics opened a new 30-room short stay unit to help ease overcrowding and streamline the hospital experience for short-term patients requiring observation.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

A Black adult woman is shown combing a black child's hair with a wide-toothed comb

During the last year and a half, nurses at Children’s Minnesota have been working to ensure that they understand how to properly care for patients with textured hair.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

LCMC Health New Orleans East Maternal Fetal Medicine ribbon cutting ceremony

In May, New Orleans East Hospital joined its LCMC Health sister hospital, Touro, to open a Maternal Fetal Health Clinic to ensure equitable prenatal care is available for patients in eastern New Orleans.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Rendering of new facilty includes buildings and parking lot

This summer, Jefferson Healthcare in Port Townsend, Wash., is modernizing their campus to continue meeting the growing needs of their community.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Poster of cancer patient with superimposed text: Community partnerships provide vital resources fo patients and families in need of extra support throughout their cancer journey. In 2022 we were proud to be a part of 25 community events.

Located inside Providence Portland Medical Center, the Providence Cancer Institute of Oregon collaborates with community partners to end cancer disparities and improve community health. Providence nurse navigators and oncology social workers work closely with patients who may have difficulty accessing the services they need, and educational materials are patient-friendly and available in several languages.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Bienvenidos a Fuerza Unida

The University of Texas Health System at San Antonio supports training for 275 new community health workers in South Texas to help improve access to health care services for historically marginalized communities.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Closeup of black patient's arm with blood pressure cuff

Indiana hospitals and health systems are working together to develop centralized equity reports that allow the providers to compare quality outcomes across different demographic groups. By working together, the hospitals are increasing access to preventive care and customizing the patient experience to improve health outcomes and ensure all people get the health care they need.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Woman in button up shirt signs in ASL

Through collaborative community efforts, Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical has improved access to quality care for the deaf and hard of hearing community. The heath system offers a wide range of services, including video remote interpreting, childbirth and related health education taught using American Sign Language, and annual training for team members on awareness of cultural and language differences.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Drive-through health fair poster

Charleston Area Medical Center offers people in every life stage – from infants to patients 65 and older, easy access to basic health services through drive-thru health fairs. The idea is if people can’t make it to the health provider, the health provider is coming to them. It’s a new model that is working not only in West Virginia, but across the country.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

ASSIST Neighbors helping neighbors

In Montana’s northwest Flathead Valley, it is not uncommon for residents to have to travel over 30 miles away to the closest hospital. Logan Health’s ASSIST program uses trained volunteers to help local residents access and navigate essential health services and social services, addressing key social determinants of health.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Nurses flank seated patient and baby

As hospitals face financial strains, staffing shortages and other difficult conditions fueled by the pandemic, Princeton Baptist is not only keeping the lights on but going the extra mile to make sure pregnant women and their babies are getting the best care possible. The hospital offers a full range of maternity and women health services, including delivery, gynecology and a neonatal intensive care unit, in a highly personalized and supportive way.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Sanford Native American Community Outreach logo

The Native American Community Outreach initiative at Sanford Health is addressing health disparities and improving health care for Native Americans in the health system’s North Dakota, South Dakota and Minnesota communities. Focus is on collaborating with tribal leaders about health issues that matter to their communities and workforce development.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

St. Anthony staff take photo with patient and baby

Improving access and quality of maternal and infant services in rural Iowa through a regional center of excellence.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

North Mississippi Health Services Booth

North Mississippi Health Services has partnered with the Downtown Tupelo Main Street Association to improve community health and wellness at the Tupelo Farmers’ Depot.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

Patient room at a doctor's office with a reclining bed chair, rolling chair, counter with sink, hazard waste basket, and door for entry/exit.

Big city and rural hospitals partner to address critical community health needs. The goal of the partnership is to improve access to care and keep specialty resources close to home.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

The MetroHealth System new health center built in Cleveland’s near West Side neighborhood.

Titus Regional Medical Center, the last independent hospital in Northeast Texas, serves rural counties stretching along the Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana borders. TRMC battled through five surges of COVID in the past 24 months. But despite having the highest COVID rates per 100,000 in the 27 counties of Northeast Texas, the health system was able to navigate the needs of local residents, saving many lives and ranking as having the lowest mortality rate of any county in the area.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

The MetroHealth System new health center built in Cleveland’s near West Side neighborhood.

Denver Health has long supported LGBTQ+ patients by providing them with a safe place to go to get their health care. Through a wide range of LGBTQ+ health services, the hospital makes sure that every LGBTQ+ person is met with open, welcoming, safe and affirming care from a team of LGBTQ+ friendly doctors and staff.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

The MetroHealth System new health center built in Cleveland’s near West Side neighborhood.

Opened June 2020, the Cletus Jeckering Family Center of Care – Ohio City Health Center offers health services to the school’s nearly 700 students, as well as their families and the entire community.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

ChristianaCare Brings Quality Health Care to Students. Students wearing masks from Kuumba Academy Charter School cut the blue ribbon to open their new health center.

As a result of this initial work, Allina Health discovered that colorectal cancer screening rates among the health system’s Blacks and African Americans were extremely low compared to other patient populations. The problem: low-literate individuals and culturally diverse individuals with limited English proficiency faced great difficulties in understanding health information and navigating the health care system.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

ChristianaCare Brings Quality Health Care to Students. Students wearing masks from Kuumba Academy Charter School cut the blue ribbon to open their new health center.

ChristianaCare has teamed up with Kuumba Academy Charter School in Wilmington, Delaware, to establish a new student-based health center that will provide onsite preventive care, mental health care and acute care services for all 637 Kuumba Academy students. It’s just one of more than 20 student-based health centers already supported by the health system. The student-based health center is staffed by nurses and doctors who provide a range of services to meet kids' and teens' health care needs. Services can include checkups, lab tests, prescriptions, counseling and care for chronic illnesses, such as asthma and diabetes.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

A nurse assists a boy and his mother who are talking with a doctor via a telehealth system at MUSC in Charleston, South Carolina.

MUSC in Charleston, South Carolina, has developed a school-based telehealth program that contributes to improved health outcomes for children in many rural and underserved communities across the state. Data points to the program’s efficiency and effectiveness in improving health care access. For kids, the “cool” factor makes telehealth fun too.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

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Through Ascension’s Medical Mission at Home events, the health system delivers free medical care to those with limited access and who are struggling in the communities they serve. The program provides real-time delivery of organized health and social services to those who would not have access to care with follow-up care and continuity as needed. These free community health events give low-income and uninsured populations access to needed health services.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

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The Novant Health UVA Health System mobile mammography unit is a motorized coach that brings a mammography machine to where you live, work, and attend civic activities and faith-based services. Our goal is to ensure all women have access to high-quality breast health services, regardless of ability to pay or travel to a full-service imaging center.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

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Holy Cross Health knows thousands of men, women and children in their region have no health insurance and few resources to obtain ongoing health services. They have established community benefit programs to help residents obtain the care needed to maintain a healthy life and to give families a healthy start, with services including: health centers that provide patients with a medical home to access primary care; OB/GYN clinics to support women before, during and after the birth of a baby; and financial assistance programs and counselors to help reduce the financial burden that health care can have on vulnerable families.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

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Quality, accessible and affordable health care is critically important for a child’s physical and mental health, which is why Stanford Children’s is committed to improving access to primary care for children, teens and expectant mothers through transportation to medical treatment, pediatric care, education, counseling, legal advocacy and more.

Ensuring Equitable Access to Care

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Barnes-Jewish Hospital (BJC) invests millions of dollars and many volunteer hours in the St. Louis community each year, and the impact can be seen in the thousands of people whose lives are better today as a result. Throughout the pandemic, the need for community benefit programs and services endured. COVID-19 was not the only illness at hand, and patients still faced financial hardships to deal with unexpected or overwhelming medical events. BJC patients with a demonstrated financial need received more than $459.1 million in charity care or other financial assistance in 2020.

Benefiting Communities

Sublette County Health facility rendering

M Health Fairview's Project SEARCH is designed to support young adults with disabilities whose goal is employment. Interns complete three 10-week rotations in various departments at the hospital, including security, environmental services, nutrition services, supply chain, facilities and clerical.

Benefiting Communities

M Health Fairview. Caitlin Ingebritson,  Project SEARCH intern

M Health Fairview's Project SEARCH is designed to support young adults with disabilities whose goal is employment. Interns complete three 10-week rotations in various departments at the hospital, including security, environmental services, nutrition services, supply chain, facilities and clerical.

Benefiting Communities

In this conversation, Deborah Brown, senior vice president of external and regulatory affairs at NYC Health + Hospitals, discusses innovative solutions to common MAH challenges, and the many ways in which the massive public health system meets its mission of taking care of every patient who walks in their doors.

Benefiting Communities

University of Kansas Health System trainers

Doug Wiesner, director of the youth sports medicine program at the University of Kansas Health System, has been sending the organization’s athletic trainers into local high schools to care for student athletes for more than a decade.

Benefiting Communities

NYC Health + Hospitals. artist Ji Yong Kim and others in front of the mural Chromatic Symphony of Greater Harlem

NYC Health + Hospitals understands that the path to healing comes in many forms, including art. The system has sponsored the creation of nine public space murals across the city, including its most recent, titled “Chromatic Symphony of Greater Harlem.

Benefiting Communities

Corewell Health. k9 security dog Rex and Grace Bing

Rex, a 10-year-old German Sheppard that has served as a resident security police K9 for Corewell Health since 2014, retired last August. But before leaving the health system's hallways forever, he reunited with a familiar face he once comforted.

Benefiting Communities

M Health Fairview St. John's Hospital team stands at entrance to new unit

Leaders at M Health Fairview St. John’s Hospital in Minnesota are addressing crowding and capacity constraints by opening a new, 16-bed short-stay and observation unit.

Benefiting Communities

Virtua Health, Michaels leaders at groundbreaking stand ouside in front of a large rendering

Virtua Health, one of South Jersey’s biggest health care providers, is leading the way in partnership with The Michaels Organization to construct a 60,000-square-foot, multiuse building with 47 apartments as well as a medical practice in Camden.

Benefiting Communities

Samaritan Health Services. Sweet Home Medical Center building entrance.

Samaritan Health Services recently cut the ribbon on a new family health center in a rural Oregon town to ensure local access to family practice and urgent care services, thus filling a gap in care for a community where locals were forced to travel out of town to receive not just basic care, but to fill basic prescription needs.

Benefiting Communities

Boulder Community Health. Building demolition.

For decades, the Boulder Community Health hospital building stood as a beacon of hope, comfort and outstanding patient care. Now it is gone, an entire city block razed as the health organization consolidated operations at a different location. But the “bones” of the former hospital live on, still supporting the community in a new and different way.

Benefiting Communities

Dartmouth. Joanne Conroy, M.D., CEO and president of Dartmouth Health

In this conversation, John Haupert, president and CEO of Grady Health and the 2023 Chair of AHA’s Board, and Joanne Conroy, M.D., CEO and president of Dartmouth Health and incoming 2024 AHA Board Chair, discuss the multiple health care priorities of 2024, and how hospitals and health systems can redefine health care delivery.

Benefiting Communities

Intermountain Health. A mother sits nursing an infant.

A trio of Utah hospitals run by Intermountain Health are making sure that the best practice of breastfeeding has taken firm hold within their walls.

Benefiting Communities

Reading Hospital. People wearing orange vests in a warehouse stand while packing boxes.

For employees of Pennsylvania’s Reading Hospital, the passion for helping others that drew so many of them to the field of health care in the first place is now being expanded beyond hospitals walls, and subsidized by the hospital itself.

Benefiting Communities

Telling the Hospitals Story: NYC Health + Hospitals. How Hospital Food Can Fuel Sustainability Efforts.

Last year, NYC Health + Hospitals became the nation’s largest municipal health system to make plant-based food the default for inpatient meals. The patient satisfaction rating of the health system’s revamped menu soared to more than 90%, and the switch has reduced food-related carbon emissions by 36% and resulted in an initial cost savings of 59 cents per tray.

Benefiting Communities

Penn State Lancaster Medical Center. The gratitude project producers stand in front of wall of photos

A picture may be worth a thousand words, but at Penn State Health Lancaster Medical Center’s photography exhibit, on display on the main floor of the hospital, each image’s message boils really down to two: thank you.

Benefiting Communities

Hackensack Meridian Health Raritan Bay. Ribbon cutting at new Carrier Behavioral Health facility

Many hospitals and health systems across the nation would agree that the need for behavioral health services in our communities is greater than ever. The newly enlarged Carrier Behavioral Health at Raritan Bay Medical Center is Hackensack Meridian Health’s response to that need.

Benefiting Communities

Value of Systems. Dana Weston Graves, President, Sentara Princess Anne Hospital

Leaders of Beth Israel Lahey Hospital, Monument Health, Riddle Hospital, Sentara Princess Anne Hosptial, and Sanford Health discuss the value of health systems to their communities.

Benefiting Communities

Cheyenne Regional Medical Center. Photo of a female nurse in scrubs helping an older man exercise his arms

Wyoming’s Cheyenne Regional Medical Center has joined with more than 2,700 hospitals, outpatient clinics and health systems nationwide as participants in the “Age-Friendly Health Systems” initiative.

Benefiting Communities

Community Benefit videos. Jose R. Sanchez, Humboldt Park Health

In this video series, leaders from AdventHealth Orlando, Hospital Sisters Health System, Humboldt Park Health, MetroHealth System, and Sentara Princess Anne Hospital discuss the hospital's role in caring for communities.

Benefiting Communities

Physical therapist Thomas of UnityPoint Health - Grinnell Regional Medical Center explains why helping people improve and reach their goals is so fulfilling.

Benefiting Communities

Lewis County Health System sign above facility entrance

AHA recently honored Lewis County General Hospital for 75 years of membership and for its continued commitment to serving their patients and communities.

Benefiting Communities

Sign reading 'community farm' sits on the edge of a farm property in Indiana

A farm owned and operated by Community Hospital Anderson in Indiana recently completed a $2.5 million expansion that is expected to produce 30,000 pounds of produce per year to be shared with local food pantries.

Benefiting Communities

Cheyenne Regional Medical Center. A physical therapist helps an aged patient lift a weight.

Wyoming’s Cheyenne Regional Medical Center has joined more than 2,700 hospitals, outpatient clinics and health systems nationwide as participants in the “Age-Friendly Health Systems” initiative.

Benefiting Communities

Filled grocery bags stand lined up at a food pantry

Baptist Health recognizes the financial constraints that many patients face, and, in response, developed the Food Rx Program to provide nonperishable food items to patients who have an immediate need.

Benefiting Communities

HUMC building exterior at dusk

Responding to the need for increased equity in access to care, Hackensack University Medical Center (HUMC) has opened the Helena Theurer Pavilion, a new 530,000-square-foot, nine-story surgical and intensive care tower to help address health equity and work with the community to address areas of need.

Benefiting Communities

NYU Langone exterior shot

Serving New York City, known the world over as a symbol of diversity and multiculturalism and perhaps the only city on earth where more than 600 different languages are spoken in the metropolitan area, NYU Langone serves its vast variety of patients by striving hard to stay familiar with the languages, cultural rhythms and differing needs of its communities.

Benefiting Communities

Titus Regional Medical Center exterior shot of tan brick building with green trim

For area residents served by Titus Regional Medical Center (TRMC) in Mt. Pleasant, Texas, a patient with a question or concern just may be able to pick up the phone — and reach the system’s CEO directly.

Benefiting Communities

Healthy BR logo

Healthy BR is a “collective impact model,” inviting the participation and contributions of more than 90 hospitals, non-profit organizations, local businesses, schools, and governmental institutions, all working to shift the Baton Rouge community's health priorities in the direction they are needed most.

Benefiting Communities

Playground equipment photo taken by a youth photographer

A picture truly is worth a thousand words, at least the way Children’s Hospital Los Angeles uses it. Through the hospital’s 2022 Community Health Needs Assessment Youth Photovoice Project, more than 150 young Angelenos got to communicate their own sense of the welfare of their neighborhoods though the lens of a camera.

Benefiting Communities

Children in a vegetable garden surround a woman in chef togs hlding a basket of produce

The World Health Organization’s foundational principle that “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity,” could have been plucked right out of the playbook for Boston Medical Center.

Benefiting Communities

David Maine

Mercy Medical Center’s Blue Dot Human Trafficking Initiative flags potential victims of human trafficking for its team of 30 forensic nurses who serve the greater Baltimore region.

Benefiting Communities

In this Workforce Perspectives video, Blanca, an Environmental Services (EVS) Tech at Meritus Health, explains how her role helps keep both patients and hospital staff safe.

Benefiting Communities

Gabrielle Cummings, NorthShore Highland Park Hospital

The 2022 mass shooting during the Fourth of July parade in Highland Park, Illinois killed seven people, wounded another 48 and traumatized an entire community. In this emotional conversation, Gabrielle Cummings, president of NorthShore Highland Park Hospital, discusses how the hospital team responded head-on to an unfolding crisis.

Benefiting Communities

Older adult stops by Atlanticare booth to talk with health workers.

New Jerseyites turned out by the hundreds to attend AlantiCare’s Federally Qualified Health Center’s annual community health fair at Atlantic Cape Community College in Atlantic City August 11.

Benefiting Communities

A round-cheeked baby sitting in a clinic office with a health worker holding stethoscope to baby's chest

Children's Hospital Colorado has recently launched the Precision Medicine Institute, offering patients and their physicians a much more tailored and accurate way to determine the best treatment for each patient who needs care.

Benefiting Communities

Copper Queen Community Hospital, Arizona.

Copper Queen Community Hospital in Bisbee has ambitious growth plans on the drawing board that will benefit 27,820 people, according to projections. The 27,000-square-foot expansion project will house operating rooms, pre-and post-operative areas, a sterile processing area and a new unit for inpatient beds.

Benefiting Communities

A young patient with a bandaged head sits upright in a hospital bed, holding an ipad

Children who need dialysis, treatment for a chronic condition or an overnight stay at University of Michigan Health C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital now have access to one of more than 150 new iPads during their stay.

Benefiting Communities

A young patient gets a tip from his caddy, who is crouched at eye level to the child

Things tend to get competitive on the makeshift nine-hole miniature golf course located at the University of Kentucky’s baseball field – especially on the day of the annual Mini Pro-Am tournament, where patients at UK HealthCare’s Kentucky Children’s Hospital play with assistance from volunteer caddies.

Benefiting Communities

Wide shot of Overlook Medical Center

The recently dedicated Stacy Goldstein Breast Center within Overlook Medical Center promises to offer world-class breast cancer services to members of the New Jersey community, according to the family whose generous financial support made the new center possible

Benefiting Communities

Wide shot of the UPMC Mercy campus with the UPMC tower in the background on the left

University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) has eliminated redundant processes and reduced the time and number of people involved in a discharge while boosting patient satisfaction scores.

Benefiting Communities

Kelly Galloway of Children's Hospital Colorado discusses the partnership with a local reporter in this video still

A special partnership between Children's Hospital Colorado and the Aurora Housing Authority is helping patients and families facing housing insecurity.

Benefiting Communities

End the Violence toolkit website image

In Spokane, Wash., Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center is partnering with the Spokane Regional Domestic Violence Coalition to provide a toolkit for comprehensive workplace training program for businesses and nonprofits to access online, with in-person training or a combination of those two.

Benefiting Communities

female physician and female executive have walking meeting in hospital atrium

Five female leaders at Edison, N.J.-based Hackensack Meridian Health all started their careers tending to patients at the bedside. Today, they occupy top rungs in the health care leadership ladder.

Benefiting Communities

pregnant women talking to a counselor or doula

In the doula program at Swedish Hospital, doulas aim to create an empowered, patient-centered experience, informed by Swedish’s “culture work” and enhanced through collaborative exercises like emergency simulations.

Benefiting Communities

student writing exam at desk

A group of Fontana, Calif. high school seniors interested in the health care profession recently explored career paths at the Kaiser Permanente Fontana Medical Center through Kaiser Permanente’s internship program.

Benefiting Communities

Black mother cradling newborn

In honor of National Reading Month, Doctors Medical Center of Modesto, California, has gifted every baby born there in the month of March a book to help inspire a love of reading.

Benefiting Communities

Black businessman reviewing paperwork with colleague

One of the largest academic medical systems in the New York metro area, Mount Sinai Health System’s new Growth in Operations, Administrations, and Leadership Society (GOALS) program was created to increase the representation of Black men at the middle and upper levels of management within Mount Sinai.

Benefiting Communities

Conference room full of people sit watching a speaker from the community

To address the many challenging social, health and environmental issues that its communities face, Sinai Chicago has developed community-based health and social service programs that are serving thousands of individuals and families. The health system also has partnered with local organizations and the city of Chicago to invest in affordable housing and economic redevelopment in the city’s North Lawndale neighborhood.

Benefiting Communities

Health care workers in PPE stand with snacks. Text overlay: Punahou School

When children are hospitalized during the holidays, a simple gift of a toy, book or game helps to brighten their day. Kapiolani Medical Center for Women & Children knows that play is an important part of the healing process and hosts an annual Santa’s Workshop toy drive so that every hospitalized child receives a gift during the holidays. Donations provide comfort to the patients and their families and offer distractions from the challenges they face.

Benefiting Communities

Health care worker stands with patient starting at glowing screen

Natchitoches Regional Medical Center makes community health improvements a top priority, supported by an economic impact budget of $184M and strong community partnerships.

Benefiting Communities

Mon Pathways to Success poster

The Mon Pathways to Success program is working to empower positive systemic change that improves the health and lives individuals in the community of Morgantown, W.V. This program provides education and training, reliable transportation, health benefits and more to participants who are living in shelters or have lost their job due to COVID-19.

Benefiting Communities

Children's National exterior sign

Children’s National Hospital knows that no one deserves to experience violence, especially the youngest among us and opens up its first youth violence intervention program. Services include physical and emotional treatment, community support groups and safe housing.

Benefiting Communities

health fair

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed Eastern New Mexico Medical Center from a “pandemic hospital” to a regional hospital that can play a lead role in coordinating patient care among hospitals in the area, according to its CEO. ENMMC’s 2021 community benefit report highlights its work during the COVID-19 pandemic; its support to the community through charitable contributions and as a local employer; and its joint efforts with a local university and college to educate and train students as clinicians and other health care professionals.

Benefiting Communities

High schools tudents hired in the blitz.

AtlantiCare hosts a High School Hiring Blitz and offers jobs to more than 30 high school seniors. It’s a new approach to fill the talent gap in health care by creating programs that build a long-term pipeline of prospective employees.

Benefiting Communities

Young black man sits facing viewer, listening to person in suit jacket facing away from viewer.

A unique intervention and mentoring program at UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital uses a public health approach to provide equitable, trauma-informed care to patients and families impacted by violence.

Benefiting Communities

Woman with long hair holding her baby close to her chest

In June 2022, Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center partnered with Mothers’ Milk Bank Northeast to open a donor milk depot in Bangor, Maine, bringing the number of milk banks in the state to seven. These milk banks rely on donated breast milk, which is tested, pasteurized and then given to infants in need of a nutritional boost.

Benefiting Communities

View of the NorthShore hospital from the outside facing the entrance of the building.

NorthShore University Health System is making its most significant investment in health equity yet. The health system is taking action to address health disparities across the communities it serves by enlisting and mobilizing capable leaders, a diversified workforce and the right community partners.

Benefiting Communities

Man standing on podium and speaking through microphone. Behind him is the American flag and a poster board featuring the Gerrard County Lions High School Logo and name. To the right of man on the podium is another man sitting down in a table listening.

UK HealthCare has created a unique partnership with Bluegrass Community & Technical College (BCTC) and school districts in the state to support students interested in a health care career and increase interest in the health care field.

Benefiting Communities

Samaritan Health Services. People at a celebration with boxed lunches and other food.

The health system, based in Corvallis, Oregon, collaborates with local organizations to serve people who need health care, regardless of their circumstances, and to keep them healthy once they leave the hospital and health care facilities.

Benefiting Communities

Luminis Health. Living Healthier Together.

Luminis Health’s Vision 2030 Living Healthier Together, a 10-year strategic plan, focuses on community, wellness and experience, not just illness and treatment.

Benefiting Communities

Man in dress shirt and tie is presenting a facility to three individuals. They are all wearing masks.

Transforming conversations into sustainable partnerships that are having a positive impact on the health of people living in the city’s neighborhoods. One initiative to help strengthen local communities is through a partnership between Cleveland Clinic and Evergreen Cooperative Laundry.

Benefiting Communities

UMass Memorial Prioritizes ‘Anchor Mission’ Work in Its Community. Clinicians from UMass Memorial stand on the steps of their mobile medical and dental clinic.

Addressing the social drivers that influence health is a strategic imperative at UMass Memorial Medical Center, the four-campus academic medical center that’s part of the larger health system of the same name. The medical center — the largest safety net hospital in Massachusetts outside of Boston — is located in Worcester, which has a high poverty rate and the poor health outcomes and barriers to accessing health care that come with it.

Benefiting Communities

Texas Health Resources. An adult helps a group of children plant a garden.

When the community needed it most during the pandemic, Texas Health Resources, located in Arlington, Texas, reallocated $5.2 million in grants to address hunger, housing and other social needs in the communities it serves — when individuals and families needed it most. The financial move was made in response to the economic consequences caused by COVID-19, which exacerbated the disparities in health outcomes for marginalized people, including low income families and older adults.

Benefiting Communities

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As an anchor institution, University Hospitals (UH) is in a unique position to influence population health and advance economic opportunities for their communities. They have made great strides in contributing to the health and welfare of Northeast Ohioans as well as addressing social determinants of health. UH provided $3.24 billion over the past decade in community benefit through the deployment of targeted programs and initiatives, including $483 million in 2020 alone.

Benefiting Communities

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Cincinnati Children’s values it’s partnerships in all the communities it serves, and in particular Avondale, the place they call home. They are making investments and connecting with Avondale neighbors in meaningful ways through a primary focus areas to reduce infant mortality and prematurity, improve kindergarten readiness and third-grade reading and improve the community’s health.

Benefiting Communities

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Silver Cross Hospital has been committed to taking care of those in need of healthcare. Every day, the hospital tries to fulfil the promise to treat all patients The Way They Should Be Treated while continuing to provide added benefits to the communities they serve. They do this in many ways including community partnerships, education, volunteerism, donations and subsidizing much-needed programs and services.

Benefiting Communities

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Northridge Hospital is dedicated to improving community health and delivering community health benefits through engagement in specific programs and services designed to address identified significant community health needs including:

  • homelessness and affordable housing
  • obesity
  • mental health
  • substance use
  • diabetes and other chronic disease wellness
  • child and adult violence prevention
  • COVID-19 community support

Benefiting Communities

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Virginia’s hospitals and health systems provided more $3.1 billion in community benefit and other types of community support in the Commonwealth in 2020, in addition to accounting for $45 billion in positive economic impact for the state.

Supporting Public Health

Jefferson Health. Jefferson team and community members at the Pride at the Jefferson Center for healthy ribbon-cutting

In the first of its kind program, Jefferson Health announced the opening in late 2023 of "Pride at the Jefferson Center for Healthy Aging," a program dedicated to caring for Philadelphia's aging LGBTQIA+ community, combining clinical care and research efforts to create a primary care home for LGBTQIA+ older adults.

Supporting Public Health

Providence Holy Cross Medical Center. A Providence health worker at a community event talking to area youth

Providence Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills, Calif., knows that supporting victims of local violence involves more than treating patients in the aftermath of it.

Supporting Public Health

Rosebud Health Care Center. Stock iimage of anon clinician in white coat holding out a smart phone with an Rx app graphic in the screen.

Rosebud Health Care Center (RHCC) is launching a new pharmacy service that allows health care providers to deliver medications to patients 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Supporting Public Health

Graphic of female silhouettes on a circle with overlaid text: Menstrual Products for All

The Lowcountry Period Pixies and the Medical University of South Carolina Children’s Health are teaming up to give menstrual products to those who need them.

Supporting Public Health

Exterior shot of Maui Memorial Medical Center

Maui Memorial Medical Center staff have been on the frontlines of treating victims of the devastating wildfires that started burning Aug. 8.

Supporting Public Health

A health worker in full-body PPE to protect against deadly Marburg virus loads a patient wrapped in PPE into an ambulance

In early August, NYC Health + Hospitals led a training exercise testing the health care system’s ability to identify, isolate and safely transport “patients” with simulated Marburg virus symptoms.

Supporting Public Health

Exterior shot of M Health Fairview building overlaid with text: 10,000+ kidney donations

TBy serving as “kidney transplant patient 10,001,” Dale Sorensen becomes the face of M Health Fairview’s major milestone.

Supporting Public Health

Stock photo of an adolescent girl wearing hoodie and looking upset, sitting outside on rundown building steps

A new depression and anxiety clinic has been opened by Children's Mercy Kansas City as the first of 14 mental health projects the hospital is launching during the next five years.

Supporting Public Health

A young male and older female staffer fill grocery bags for new mothers

To help mothers in need of food following childbirth, SSM Health St. Mary's Hospital in Madison, Wisc., is providing baskets of groceries to those who need it as part of a new program.

Supporting Public Health

Three health workers train on simulator

The Missouri School of Medicine is using mobile simulators — mannequins that breathe, talk and move — to help train nurses in rural areas across the state in preparation for events that would overwhelm their emergency rooms.

Supporting Public Health

NWoman stands at podium wearing tee that reads Your Fight is Our Fight

At Kadlec Regional Medical Center, which serves Washington state’s Tri-Cities region, nurses can undergo special training to help them care for sexual assualt survivors.

Supporting Public Health

Catalina Island Medical Center exterior photo

Catalina Island Medical Center may be on a small island, but it has an outsized influence when it comes to providing care. As the only hospital serving Avalon, Calif., CIMC staff also care for more than one million patients who visit the island annually.

Supporting Public Health

Mason Health green team holds Practice Greenhealth award

Mason Health in Shelton, Wash. has taken major steps to become more energy efficient, reduce waste, and source materials locally while continuing to provide quality care to patients.

Supporting Public Health

UC Davis employee Aaron Brazier helps amputee Jue Cary with his dreadlocks

At UC Davis Medical Center in Sacramento, Calif., Aaron Brazier decided to give back to the hospital that saved his son’s life by sharing his 20 years of hair care expertise with patients.

Supporting Public Health

Poster of pinwheels planted in a garden. Text: You Can Help Kids' HOPE Center Create a Community Where No Child Experiences Neglect or Abuse

On April 3, Bay Area Hospital’s Kids’ Hope Center — based in Coos Bay, Ore. — commemorated National Child Abuse Prevention Month by covering the center’s property with a sea of vibrant pinwheels.

Supporting Public Health

stock photo of health worker in PPE taking patient's temperature in triage bay

NYC Health + Hospitals, which operates the public hospitals and clinics in New York City, announced plans to ensure New Yorkers continue to have the access to COVID-19 testing, vaccination, and treatment, as well as services to address Long COVID in all five boroughs.

Supporting Public Health

WVU Medicine expert Lisa Costello, MD

As the respiratory illnesses spread, experts at WVU Medicine Children’s Hospital began to share vital information addressing the ‘tridemic,’ to help keep kids safe, avoid hospitalizations and lessen the burden on the health system.

Supporting Public Health

Getting your COVID vaccine today is quick, easy ad free! Find a location near you: UFHealth.org/FLVaccines

With COVID-19 cases and hospital admissions ticking up in early 2023, University of Florida Health — which serves all Florida counties — continues to encourage people to get vaccinated and boosted. The UF Health website features “Your Guide to COVID-Shots” with vaccine availability by county, stories from community champions and resources for community partners.

Supporting Public Health

Female RN in scrubs and badge stands in front of patient room in hospital

Despite data on the large numbers of people who have suffered and even died from COVID-19, many still don’t fear the virus and remain unvaccinated. That was the case of an unvaccinated man in New Hampshire until COVID-19 hospitalized him at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center and nearly took his life. Today, he is in good health and vaccinated.

Supporting Public Health

Bill Mueller at lectern

Fewer than 1 in 4 pediatric hospital beds are available nationwide, according to data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. A pediatric infectious disease physician at Lurie Children’s Hospital in Chicago talks about the growing risks of infectious diseases, such as COVID-19, and preventing hospitalizations by getting children vaccinated.

Supporting Public Health

How to have a patient-centered conversation about COVID vaccines

An animated video course describes seven distinct vaccine-related mindsets, or personas, and models how health care professionals can apply person-centered communication strategies when discussing COVID-19 vaccination. The online course, created by the Stanford Center for Continuing Medical Education and based on a recent research study, focuses on using active listening strategies and motivational interviewing.

Supporting Public Health

How important are vaccines? Ask Maria.

Two healthy children overcame severe illness due to COVID-19, receiving care and treatment at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston. Both children had developed MIS-C, a rare but serious condition associated with COVID-19. Texas Children’s has released a video of the parents sharing their stories — and urging other parents to get their children vaccinated against COVID-19.

Supporting Public Health

David Cornfield on CBS news segment on respiratory viruses

Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford, part of the Stanford Medicine Children’s Health Network, is at “level 3 alert” capacity rate due to the triple threat of COVID-19, RSV and the flu. That’s one step away of putting tents outside the hospital’s front doors. Health officials say getting vaccinated is the best defense to avoiding overcrowded hospitals and keeping kids healthy for the holidays.

Supporting Public Health

Know where to go - RSV and other respiratory infections poster

Clinicians at St. Louis Children’s Hospital are making sure parents and caregivers know how to evaluate respiratory illness symptoms when children get sick during the peak of cold and flu season when RSV and COVID-19 cases are expected to rise. The hospital continues to urge COVID-19 vaccination for children age 6 months and older, emphasizing the importance of vaccinating young children to prevent death, avoid severe illness and help protect all family members.

Supporting Public Health

a boy and a girl show off their vaccine bandages

When COVID-19 vaccines were first authorized for children, infectious disease specialists at Akron Children’s Hospital shared evidence-based information and answered parents’ and caregivers’ questions. The hospital team continues to discuss the latest updates on COVID-19 and allergies, asthma and flu in kids as new boosters become available.

Supporting Public Health

Let's Band Together - Munson Healthcare poster

Urging its communities to “band together to take action,” Munson Healthcare in Michigan has released eye-catching videos and other resources to encourage people of all ages to stay up to date on COVID-19 vaccines and boosters. Emphasizing the intense safety monitoring and testing of these vaccines, the health system also shares information geared to parents: “The more kids who are vaccinated the better vaccines work.”

Supporting Public Health

Project Art Heals Utah

Clinical leaders at the University of Utah Health are sharing data and stories to encourage people to get vaccinated or boosted against COVID-19. The health system also is the epicenter of Project Art Heals Utah, a collaborative art project that honors the “shared resilience” of communities during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Supporting Public Health

Poster: COVID-19 Vaccine - 6 Facts you need to know

As kids head back to school, Children’s Mercy is sharing helpful information for parents and teens on COVID-19 vaccines, urging that everyone age six months and older get vaccinated. The info emphasizes the facts about COVID-19 vaccines, including how they were developed, how mRNA vaccines works and what to expect after receiving the vaccine.

Supporting Public Health

Black boy with bandaid on bicep gives thumbs up gesture

While masks have been removed from most school supply lists this season, health care officials say new variants, such as BA.5, can spread quickly putting kids and families at risk.

Supporting Public Health

Dr. Sarah Bosslet, Riley Children's Health Director of Primary Care

Riley Children’s Health is working to ensure that children, including those under age 5, get the COVID-19 vaccine, by hosting vaccine clinics across the Indianapolis area and ramping up access to the vaccine in pediatrician offices. The hospital also partnered with The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis to vaccinate hundreds of children.

Supporting Public Health

Black man with bandaid on bicep holds sign that says For You. For me. For Arkansas.

To encourage Arkansas residents of all ages to get the COVID-19 vaccine and booster, Baptist Health has set up vaccine clinics across the state at banks, churches, schools, shopping malls and more. These community locations provide convenient access for people to get their COVID-19 shots and, in some cases, receive an incentive. Most recently, the health system is holding immunization clinics with free back-to-school shots, including the COVID-19 vaccine, for children 12 and older.

Supporting Public Health

Boston Red Sox baseball

Red Sox baseball players are among the Boston area community members who have recorded videos sharing why they got the COVID-19 vaccine. Posted on the Beth Israel Lahey Health website, the stories inspire others to get vaccinated and are part of the health system’s wide-ranging efforts to encourage COVID-19 vaccination.

COVID-19 Care and Vaccine Efforts

Woman holding book, framed in a picture with the title saying got my vaccine.

To encourage all New Yorkers to get a COVID-19 vaccine and booster, NYC Health + Hospitals is featuring stories and videos of people sharing why they got their shots, including 99-year-old New Yorker Lettice Graham

COVID-19 Care and Vaccine Efforts

Kid with yellow helmet and a face mask raising both hands in the air outside

Children’s Hospital Colorado has kept families informed with up-to-date news, resources and expert clinical advice about COVID-19 and vaccines. The hospital recently partnered with the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to administer COVID-19 vaccines to children between 6 months and 5 years at mobile clinics at the hospital’s campuses.

COVID-19 Care and Vaccine Efforts

Child being vaccinated against COVID-19 by a medical worker, both of them are wearing face masks

Seattle Children’s Hospital is taking a collaborative approach with parents to vaccinate young children against COVID-19.

COVID-19 Care and Vaccine Efforts

Person holding posters with messages to mask up, get vaccinated, and get boosted

Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s COVID-19 vaccine confidence virtual learning courses are designed to turn community leaders and influencers, such as PTA leaders, school nurses, faith-based leaders and local business owners, into vaccine advocates and promote vaccine acceptance in their communities.

COVID-19 Care and Vaccine Efforts

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Omaha-based Nebraska Medicine shares stories about the safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines, supported by analyses of 2021 COVID-19 statewide data. Nebraska Medicine is sharing this information as part of its continuing communications outreach to encourage people to receive a COVID-19 vaccine and booster.

COVID-19 Care and Vaccine Efforts

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Though 80% of Rhode Islanders have received two doses of COVID-19 vaccine, Care New England says it’s not enough until all eligible are vaccinated and boosted. Care New England, based in Providence, Rhode Island, has released a series of short videos with health care leaders thanking community members for being diligent about getting vaccinated but also urging them to “get a booster vaccine today.”

COVID-19 Care and Vaccine Efforts

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In this Advancing Health podcast, Jeffrey Flaks, CEO of Hartford HealthCare, and Rebecca Stewart, vice president of content strategy, discuss the health system’s efforts to connect with the community during the pandemic, build trust and get people vaccinated. Flaks and Stewart join Kathy Cummings, AHA’s director of communications, for a conversation about how Hartford HealthCare is changing health care for the better, connecting with people in meaningful ways and helping get more people vaccinated against COVID-19.

COVID-19 Care and Vaccine Efforts

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Vermont sits atop all other states with the highest percentage of its population fully vaccinated against COVID-19: As of early February 2022, 80% of Vermont residents have completed vaccination and 64% have received a booster. And although hospitalizations due to COVID-19 are higher this winter than during the peak in winter 2021 — largely attributed to the coronavirus delta and omicron variants — the hospitalization rate in Vermont was the lowest across the United States.

Prevention and Wellness

How One Health System Rewrote a Menu and Big Cliché

A hospital’s food menu can color patients’ perceptions of quality care. Northwell Health, New York State’s largest health care provider, took that truth to heart as it spent significant time and effort in upgrading the millions of meals it serves each year. The overall reaction? More, please!

Prevention and Wellness

Lovelace UNM Rehabilitation Hospital. Cesar and Lily Colmenero and family with Lovelace staff

Lily Colmenero made a special point of expressing her gratitude to care teams and staff members at Lovelace UNM Rehabilitation Hospital who care for her husband, Cesar, as he battles the effects of multiple sclerosis (MS) with bravery, determination and a willingness to fight back against this debilitating disease of the central nervous system.

Prevention and Wellness

This special series explores the medical complications that can accompany pregnancy, successful prenatal and postpartum treatment programs, and how hospitals and health systems are addressing the social needs of new mothers. In this episode, Laura La Porte, LCSW, manager of the Perinatal Depression Program at Endeavor Health, and new mom Anna Ma, discuss how the program supports a new mother's mental health and provides avenues for parents to seek help.

Prevention and Wellness

Telling the Hospital Story: Wallowa Memorial Hospital. An older man sits smiling while gloved hands administer vaccine in his arm

Emergency preparedness and routine immunizations have more in common than meets the eye. Both are preventative measures that safeguard not only the individual, but also the collective. When combined, they can be an effective way to mobilize community members to make healthy choices for their future selves.

Prevention and Wellness

Image of Telling the Hospital Story: Holy Name Medical Center

Although there are no clear-cut guidelines for how long cardio pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) should be continued, the most favorable neurological outcomes are achieved when CPR is started immediately, with a duration of 21-25 minutes.

Prevention and Wellness

Stacy Garrett-Ray, M.D., senior vice president and chief community impact officer at Ascension Health

Stacy Garrett-Ray, M.D., senior vice president and chief community impact officer at Ascension Health, and X’Laodai Mack, new mom and Ascension patient, discuss how the health system is addressing social determinants of health to support mothers and their babies.

Prevention and Wellness

Ochsner Health - Nigel Gigrah,M.D.

In this conversation, Nigel Girgrah, M.D., chief wellness officer at Ochsner Health, discusses his evolution in workforce well-being, building a business case for organizational buy-in and the importance of combining leadership with mental health transparenc

Prevention and Wellness

Nalu and team at Tripler Army Medical Center

When pediatric patients at Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu, Hawaii, are feeling distressed, they can find comfort in Nalu, a two-year-old Labrador retriever and the cuddliest member of the TAMC team.

Prevention and Wellness

A personal trainer coaches a client on a treadmill

Brattleboro Memorial Hospital in Vermont is offering a new, free Wellness PLUS Program for people at risk for heart and lung disease due to diabetes, high blood pressure, tobacco use, obesity and sedentary lifestyle.

Prevention and Wellness

Walk With A Doc group poses on a trail

Yale New Haven Hospital in Connecticut partners with Get Healthy CT for "Walk & Talk with a Doc," an opportunity on Saturday mornings for community members to walk with YNHH physicians and discuss specific health care topics

Prevention and Wellness

FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital. A North Carolina hospital is reading to their tiniest patients. Here’s why.

In September 2023, the staff and patient families of the Clarke Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital in Pinehurst, N.C. took part in a friendly competition to see who could read the most to their patients.

Prevention and Wellness

Paul Rains, CommonSpirit Health

In this conversation, Paul Rains, senior vice president of behavioral health at CommonSpirit Health, discusses ideas and shared best practices to ensure that every health care worker is cared for and supported across the organization.

Prevention and Wellness

dog in flannel shirt photographed next to image of Taylor Swift album cover bearing similar outfit

On Aug. 8, UCLA Santa Monica hosted a lunchtime “fashion show” starring therapy animals, dressed in Taylor Swift-inspired outfits that reflected different periods of Swift’s music. Though the general public also enjoyed the event, the guests of honor were hospitalized and critically ill children and adults.

Prevention and Wellness

five smiling, diverse teens gathered in teen health center

Sutter Health, based out of Sacramento, Calif., is partnering with Twin Rivers Unified School District, the Neighborhood Wellness Foundation, and the Sacramento Native American Health Center to make mental and physical health resources more accessible for local teens.

Prevention and Wellness

Stock photo of female health worker in glasses and scrubs talking to colleagues

Who helps the helpers? In the case of Wake Forest University School of Medicine, a participant in the AHA-led Suicide Prevention in the Health Care Workforce collaborative, special training gave health care workers guidance on how to care for one another.

Prevention and Wellness

Hershey staff surround Skye the golden retriever

What’s better when you’re feeling scared than a visit from a canine friend? Many hospitals and health systems are embracing trained emotional support dogs to support staff, patients and their families during difficult times.

Prevention and Wellness

girls hands displaying corsages on wrists

For some hospitalized teens in California, having their young life put on hold due to medical care won’t apply to that famous high school event: prom. Patients will have a full prom experience, from dressing up to hitting the dance floor, even as they recover from serious health problems.

Prevention and Wellness

Split screen video of three women in a video chat discussing womens health

“Real Talk,” an online women’s health education series by Virtua Health, features unfiltered, interactive chats with medical experts on a wide-range of health topics. It’s inspiring, informative programming aimed at helping women (and their families) live longer and better.

Prevention and Wellness

Woman with dog by her side sits in vail health branded lawn chair at an outdoor event

Vail Health in Eagle River Valley, Colo. collaborated with local mental health providers, first responders and others to address the “paradise paradox” and stem a surge in suicides.

Prevention and Wellness

#HoustonHealthy event

Houston Healthcare President and Chief Executive Officer Charles Briscoe recently announced the launch of a new Community Healthcare Initiative called #HoustonHealthy. The goal of this initiative is to encourage everyone in Houston County to focus on preventative health measures as a way to protect against diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, cancer and, of course, COVID-19.

Prevention and Wellness

PeaceHealth Wellness Wednesday Cancer Screening for Filipinos Poster

PeaceHealth Ketchikan Medical Center is joining forces with Ketchikan Wellness Coalition on a $300,000 grant funded program to advance health equity among the Alaska’s growing Filipino population.

Prevention and Wellness

dog and handler next to blue bus

VA Southern Nevada Health is finding new ways to prevent substance misuse among veterans at risk and build relationships. Canine drug detection teams are doing more than just confiscating illegal narcotics, the well-trained dogs are helping to develop a positive bond between patients and police and create a friendly atmosphere for prevention and treatment.

Prevention and Wellness

Caring & Sharing: Home is Where the Heart Is card

The Brookings Health System Foundation makes it easy for colleagues to help other colleagues struggling through tough times exacerbated by the pandemic through an employee emergency fund program. The program offers a wide range of support services, including meals and cleaning services, to staff working long hours.

Prevention and Wellness

2022 Wheelchair Pickleball Series poster

Based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Mary Free Bed provides and promotes competitive and recreational wheelchair and adaptive sports teams and classes for people of all ages with disabilities. With one of the nation’s largest sports program for people with disabilities, the rehabilitation hospital offers a variety of opportunities for people to increase their physical activity, reduce the risk of or help manage chronic conditions — and have fun while doing it.

Prevention and Wellness

illustration depicts black parent reading book to baby seated on lap

In Georgia, a hospital and its affiliated OB/GYN and pediatrics offices are implementing a new program to help all babies and toddlers gain access to foundational skills necessary to build literacy. Called Talk with My Baby, the program aims to help every child learn to read by the third grade.

Prevention and Wellness

Five people dressed professionally, three of them sitting on a couch while the other two are standing. They are all posing for a picture.

WellSpan Health, which serves central Pennsylvania and northern Maryland, has bolstered its efforts to become a more diverse and data-driven culture, resulting in positive outcomes for patients and staff.

Prevention and Wellness

stethoscope placed on a LGBTQ+ flag with a LGBTQ+ themed heart sticker next to the stethoscope

Health care disparities exist among the LGBTQ community because patients often times refuse to seek treatment or assistance worrying that health care providers may not respect their gender identity or sexual orientation. Inova Health opened the first medical clinic in Northern Virginia, called Inova Pride, dedicated to the health and well-being of the LGBTQ+ community.

Prevention and Wellness

Representatives of the university hospital dressed professionally, standing on the staircase of a building and posing for a professional picture

All employees at University Hospitals, based in Cleveland, are aligned around its Zero Harm initiative: zero clinical harm, zero suffering from a poor patient experience, zero inequities and zero wasted resources.

Prevention and Wellness

Three women posing for a picture, smiling, and wearing scrubs while the woman in the middle is holding a plaque award.

St. James Parish Hospital’s 3D mammography team receives the Skin Marking in Mammography Excellence Award from Beekley Medical for clear communication and precise interpretation for the best patient care.

Prevention and Wellness

Community Memorial Health System. People around tables arranged in a square at a caregiver navigator program meeting.

In the fall of 2020, CRMC’s population health division launched a three-month campaign that covered multiple topics dealing with opioid use disorder: how to get help, how to talk to providers about alternatives to opioids and the importance of stigma reduction.

Prevention and Wellness

Community Memorial Health System. People around tables arranged in a square at a caregiver navigator program meeting.

According to a 2020 report by the National Alliance for Caregiving and AARP, more than 50 million Americans are family caregivers and their health is significantly declining, which negatively impacts their ability to care for their loved ones living with serious illnesses. Community Memorial Health System and its partners created a caregiver navigator program to support family caregivers and integrate them as part of the patients’ health care teams.

Prevention and Wellness

AdventHealth Hendersonville Age-Friendly Task Force gathered together.

Teams work together across the health system and with community partners to meet the care needs of patients and families during every stage of life and health. The health system incorporates age-friendly care into annual wellness visits for older adult patients and includes age-friendly initiatives as part of its annual strategic and financial planning.

Prevention and Wellness

Nurse writing down information on notepad while talking with patient.

Hackensack Meridian Health’s Maternal Health Task Force, a blue-ribbon panel of internal and external experts dedicated to improving maternal health outcomes. The task force’s goal is to make New Jersey the safest state in the nation to have a baby.

Prevention and Wellness

Nurse writing down information on notepad while talking with patient.

At St. John’s Riverside Hospital, two-thirds of the patient population is over the age of 65. The leadership team at the hospital in Yonkers, New York, has made providing age-friendly care a priority. They know that providing care that is age friendly helps older adults enjoy a better quality of life.

Prevention and Wellness

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With in-person events no longer possible due to stay-at- home orders and health and safety restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic, Carilion Clinic’s Community Health and Outreach team found a new way to continue to bring free health education to the community. Beginning in April 2020, health educators in all hospital markets transitioned to “Take a Break” virtual education sessions to provide timely, relevant tips focused on improving well-being and maintaining a healthy lifestyle during an uncertain time.

Prevention and Wellness

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To help empower all members of the community to enjoy the healthiest lifestyle possible, Hunting Hospital is dedicated to providing health and outreach services to meet the needs of its community. The hospital provides free health screening, counseling, education and referrals. Staff are active all year participating in community, faith organization, and school health fairs and events, working with many community-based organizations, health clinics and schools. These interactions inform the hospital about community health needs and allow them to respond with appropriate services.

Prevention and Wellness

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The Nuvance Health hospitals are dedicated to serving the community as a wellness resource. This includes providing health education and wellness opportunities, offering community outreach programs to promote wellness and preventive medicine. Offerings include:

  • Speaker’s bureau for nonprofit organizations and civic clubs
  • Holding blood drives
  • Hosting health fairs and a variety of community wellness events
  • Community forums on disease management and education
  • Health Talk, public education television show to promote healthy lifestyles
  • Opioid-abuse prevention initiative

Prevention and Wellness

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Lakewood Engage is the cornerstone initiative of Lakewood Health System’s community health division and the engine that drives all its food insecurity programs. In 2020, Lakewood Health System connected more than 1,300 children, seniors, low-income individuals and patients with chronic health conditions to one of its seven programs designed to address the challenges and health consequences of hunger and food security.

Since the inception of Lakewood Engage in 2013, it has evolved from simply connecting local produce growers to patients at its hospital-based Staples Area Farmers Market to constructing a comprehensive clinic-based referral program that prescribes local produce to patients through its “Food Farmacy” market.

Prevention and Wellness

Memmorial Hermann Role of Hospitals Image

The lack of community mental health programs means that patients wait until their situations become a crisis before reaching out for care. Memorial Herman operated three mental health crisis clinics that operate as “urgent care” options for individuals experiencing mental health and behavioral concerns. They offer emergency medicine administration, counseling, solution-focused intervention, psychosocial assessments and safety planning. The staff work to connect patients with an outpatient providers and arrange for follow-up appointments.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

University of Maryland Medical Center. Cinician trains to intubate using a trauma center mannequin.

The Critical Care and Trauma Simulation Center at the University of Maryland Medical Center is one of the most technologically advanced training centers in the region. There, doctors, nurses and other medical professionals train on mannequins that breathe, whose eyes respond to light, and who even bleed when an IV is placed.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center exterior shot of facility against a cloudy blue sky

The U.S. has more than 6 million people living with heart failure, and many of them are hospitalized with symptoms such as excess fluid retention, which can result in shortness of breath. Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center is trying something new which can help patients and reduce hospitalizations.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Loma Linda University Childrens Hospital. Two Children and a woman view the interactive Loma Land exhibit

For some kids, few things are as nerve-racking as an upcoming hospital visit. The blank white walls, labyrinthian hallways and conversations with unfamiliar grownups can feel intimidating and uncomfortable. But Loma Linda University Children’s Hospital in California seeks to soothe these young patients with a little bit of imagination known as Loma Land.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

HCA Florida. Dr. Saurabh Sanon and cardiology team at HCA West Florida stand posed in operating room

Esther Whitley had a mitral valve leak, meaning blood was flowing in the wrong direction. There was also another, more serious complication: A tumor was present on her heart, which would usually require open-heart surgery to remove. That procedure would carry risk for any patient, but at age 86, it was an impossibility for Whitley. There simply wasn’t a way to treat her safely – until there was.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Providence. Stock photo of a mother and newborn in a labor and delivery room

When it comes to childbirth, a critical component of a positive and empowering experience is communication, and something as simple as a whiteboard can make a major difference. That’s why two Washington state-based hospitals in the Providence health care system kicked off TeamBirth, a communication-focused initiative to enhance the birthing experience and improve outcomes for patients and their babies.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Abrazo Arrowhead. Neonatal NICU equipment at new Glendale campus

A terrific new care site option is now available for Phoenix-area babies born with nearly any kind of medical condition. The Abrazo Arrowhead Campus in suburban Glendale cut the ribbon in late 2023 for a $14 million expansion of its neonatal intensive care unit.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

St. John's Hospital Camarillo Cryoablation team gathered in operating room

St. John’s Hospital Camarillo of Camarillo, Calif., recently became the first hospital in southern California and the second in the state to pioneer use a groundbreaking new treatment for AFib that is as effective as it is minimally invasive.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Michigan Medicine and Henry Ford Health. Stock illustration of cannabis leaves rising from an open pill capsule

Michigan Medicine and Henry Ford Health are partnering to launch the largest-ever clinical trial to determine if administering the marijuana-derived compound known as cannabidiol (CBD) before and after surgery may reduce the need for opioids following a total knee arthroplasty.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

West Virginia University Children’s. WVU Medicine staff work with ceVUS equipment

Anyone who’s had to guide a child through any medical procedure knows it can be difficult. At WVU Medicine Children’s, though, a new diagnostic tool is making ultrasounds a little easier for patients and their caregivers.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Keck Medicine of USC. A pregnant woman sits with one hand on lower back and one resting atop stomach

A research hospital in California is at the forefront of an international effort to prevent pregnancy nausea and vomiting, commonly known as “morning sickness.”

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Cedars Sinai. Clinicians stand near patient bedside reviewing notes as patient sits wearing BP cuff and EKG leads

Investigators at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles have found a new method for predicting csrdiac arrest through a new method for analyzing the results of electrocardiogram tests, thus adding a new dimension to a cardiovascular diagnostic that’s widely available, already sitting in clinics across the country.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Carilion Giles Community Hospital. Moxi Robots in hospital halls.

There are two new members of the team at Carilion Giles Community Hospital in Pearisburg, Va.: robots named Moxi, designed and created by Diligent Robotics to assist hospital staff. They’re specialists in supporting frontline staff by taking away some of the time-consuming elements of the job.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Bridgeport Hospital. Product photo of advanced biplane neuro-angiography imaging system

Connecticut’s Bridgeport Hospital, part of Yale New Haven Health, is treating stroke patients using the most advanced biplane neuro-angiography imaging system.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital of New York-Presbyterian. Brooklyn Civil and Mia Skaats, domino surgery organ recipients, sit on their mother's laps

On May 10, 2023, Baby Mia Skaats eceived a new heart in a “domino” transplant procedure at New York Presbyterian Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital, the first one performed in babies. A domino transplant surgery occurs when one person is both a donor for a transplant and a recipient of another organ.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Hartford HealthCare. Stock photo of health worker in white coat seated with laptop computer with hologram of human anatomy over keys

Hartford HealthCare is partnering with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for a collaborative focused on holistic artificial intelligence in medicine. 

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital. Musician plays guitar for Avah and family

What happens when a baby is born more than three months early? In the case of Avah Hernandez, who earned “micro-preemie” status when she was born only 1 pound and 2 ounces at 23 weeks, that meant spending a year hospitalized at UCSF Benioff Oakland, Calif., receiving care and support in a variety of ways. 

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

New Mexico Lovelace Medical Center. Stock photo of surgeons operating in theater

In August, two cardiologists with Albuquerque’s Heart Hospital of New Mexico at Lovelace Medical Center performed the state’s first PASCAL Precision implant procedure for patients with mitral regurgitation, resulting in more precise positioning and less damage to the patient’s mitral value by avoiding invasive surgery.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Stock photo of surgeons in operating theater

This summer UC Davis Health in Sacramento expanded the services of their UC Davis Transplant Center to include liver transplants — making it the third solid organ transplant program to launch at the hospital.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

As the nursing profession continues to evolve, it is embracing new technologies and practices that allow nurses to focus on what matters most — their patients.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Havana holds a photo of hersel as a NICU patient

Time and the odds were heavily stacked against Havana, born with a potentially fatal heart valve deformity that made corrective surgery to her tiny newborn’s body a risk that doctors at the Children's Hospital Colorado Heart Institute were reluctant to take.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Intermountain surgeons with da Vinci XI robotic-assisted surgical system

In late September, students from Park City High School’s Center for Advanced Professional Studies participated in a high-tech robotic operating room experience at Intermountain Park City Hospital to get an up-close look and hands-on experience with robot-assisted surgery.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Stock photo of health worker in blue scrubs holding a table computer, nurses station in the background

Artificial intelligence has come to the forefront of emergency visits at LMH Health in Kansas, where a new program is being used to supplement the initial assessment of a patient’s illness or injury after they’re examined by a human triage nurse.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Daniel Eagle and partner, dressed in cycling safety gear, pose with bikes

Daniel Eagle chose to partner with the oncology care team at Loma Linda University Medical Center–Murrieta in California when he was told he had early-stage prostate cancer.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Abington nurses stand lined up next to mobile virtual assistant units

Abington Hospital, a member of Philadelphia-based Jefferson Health, has piloted a program that pairs bedside nurses with a “virtual nurse” who assists with these routine administrative tasks, including discharge and answering patients’ questions.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Heart valve next to a lab specimen cup

A new pulmonary valve used on patients at Michigan-and-Illinois-based OSF HealthCare doesn't require open-heart surgery to implant it, and patients are able to walk again a few hours after the procedure.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Siemens Biograph Vision™ PET/CT scanner at Cheyenne Regional Medical Center

This summer, Cheyenne Regional Medical Center became the first and so far only medical facility in Wyoming to offer the Siemens Biograph Vision™, a next generation positron emission tomography/computed tomography (PET/CT) scanner that yields medical images with greater accuracy and efficiency and with less radiation exposure than older scanners.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Mass General Brigham staff at the discharge lounge

To ease patients’ transition from hospital to home and address bed capacity issues, Mass General Brigham has created a discharge lounge. The lounge serves about 125 patients who are waiting for their transportation, making this transition “seamless and stress-free.”

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

exterior shot of Providence St. Patrick Hospital

Providence St. Patrick Hospital in Missoula, Mont., has for the first time earned The Joint Commission's Comprehensive Cardiac Center Certification, effective through June 2025, for its provision of comprehensive cardiovascular care, treatment and services.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

oncologist sits at computer with three monitors and a ring light, using iNav

For patients at Northwell Health, oncologists have recently begun using iNav — an artificial intelligence-enabled diagnostic tool developed in-house — to spot the signs of pancreatic cancer and flag it for treatment much earlier in the process.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Stock - tightly cropped photo of lab worker, wearing white lab coat and blue latex gloves, handling test tubes

Oncology care grows ever more precise with the help of Intermountain Precision Genomics, a part of Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Health system. Working with a partner, Intermountain will begin providing oncology test results that allow access to the ComboMATCH trials.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Lake monsters pink jersey on grass

The University of Vermont Cancer Center leads several innovative programs including basic research in cancer stem cells and cancer prevention, early detection and survivorship.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Heart surgeon Tyler Gunn, MD, director of the Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation Program at Cedars-Sinai sits on the bed of patient Valance Sams Sr., who received a heart, liver and kidney transplant during a 20-hour surgery at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

At the heart of medicine is teamwork, and few procedures exemplify that value quite like a multi-organ transplant. It requires coordination from a long list of health care professionals, including staff who ensure the donated organs are identified, safely procured, and ready for operating – all well before any incisions are made.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Photo of the Patient Progression Hub shows cubicles facing wall of screens

Children’s Mercy Kansas City has launched a first-of-its-kind hospital operations center that uses artificial intelligence, predictive analytics and real-time information to optimize care progression and coordination.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

three men and a woman counselor sit in a group session

The new Kahlert Institute for Addiction Medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine opened June 14 and aims to be at the forefront of addiction research and treatment.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

PLAYERS Center dedication ceremony

Patients ranging from teens to toddlers now have an innovative place to fight their battles against cancers and blood disorders in THE PLAYERS Center for Cancer and Blood Disorders, a collaboration between Nemours Children’s Health, Jacksonville, and Wolfson’s Children’s hospital.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Health worker in full PPE

Researchers from Intermountain Health were chosen as part of a national consortium of healthcare systems and hospitals in a new federally-funded initiative that will use advanced technologies to improve treatment for patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), pneumonia, and sepsis.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Ribbon cutting ceremony at new Scottsdale facility

For fitness enthusiasts in the greater Scottsdale, Ariz. area, the person jogging on the treadmill next to them just might be turn out to be a famous professional athlete, such as a member of the Arizona Diamondbacks or the NFL’s Cardinals.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Doctors at Allegheny General Hospital performing open heart surgery.

Since 2009, Allegheny General Hospital has permitted potential future medical students to observe live open heart surgeries performed by its surgeons and their teams. They watch through a nearby observation deck, but are not actually in the operating room and do not distract the physicians or their patients.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

stock photo of exterior of an emergency department entrance

“NYUTron,” a new artificial intelligence program now in use by New York University doctors and hospital executives, can not only read and accurately understand doctors’ notes, it can use them to predict whether a newly discharged patient will soon fall sick enough to be readmitted.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Product image of a Moxi robot

At MultiCare Deaconess Hospital in Spokane, Wash., a four-foot-tall robot named Moxi moves around the hospital on its own to run errands like taking samples to labs, getting equipment, and delivering medication to providers.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Telling the Hospital Story: Penn Medicine/Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Todd Legg, who is diagnosed with ALS talks with a reporter from Fox 29 Philadelphia on his new treatment at Penn Medicine/Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a neurodegenerative disorder of the motor neurons that connect brains to the muscle. ALS has traditionally been very hard to treat. But the picture is getting a little brighter with the advent of a new drug called Qalsody that is now in experimental trials at Penn Medicine in Philadelphia.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

futuristic concept stock art of doctor wearing stethoscope manipulating a digital hologram of a heart in a medical file

When Eloise McCloskey turned 11, she got the best birthday present she and her family could have asked for: a phone call from Stanford Medicine Children’s Health, telling her a donor heart had been identified for her.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

stock photo of doctor holding stethoscope gesturing at laptp screen showing brain image rendering

Two hospitals in California’s San Luis Obispo County are leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to detect strokes, using an app called Viz.ai to read patients’ CT scan results to identify symptoms within minutes.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

healthcare team huddle shot from below

Jefferson Health recently subscribed to the Nurse Emeritus Program across all 18 of its hospitals throughout Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The national program allows retired nurses to stay engaged on their own terms, working less than full time, at the bedside or in the department, with lots of freedom in terms of where they work.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Vivistim system components: implant, wireless transmitter, controller, and laptop with software interface displayed

Atlantic Health System recently became the first in New Jersey to use Micro Transponder®, Inc.’s Vivistim® Paired VNS™ System, an FDA-approved, breakthrough technology for stroke survivors experiencing ongoing hand and arm impairment.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

female health worker holding tablet talks with female patient wearing scarf on her head

Cody Regional Health is one of the few hospitals in Wyoming to offer Tyrer-Cuzick Scoring, a new type of breast cancer risk scoring, and staff hope to eventually integrate automated breast density assessment, artificial intelligence and deep machine learning techniques into the program.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Robot hand holds stethoscope aloft

At Eisenhower Hospital in Rancho Mirage, Calif., medical trainees are using simulator mannequins that can imitate a wide range of human behavior. The mannequins are part of Eisenhower’s new high-tech simulation laboratory, the John Stauffer Center for Innovation in Learning.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

surgeon operating in theater

University Hospital,New Jersey’s academic medical center and the principal teaching hospital for Rutger’s New Jersey Medical School, offers advanced prostate cancer treatment promising shorter recovery times.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Zipline drone flies across blue sky trailing a small red package

In 2024, Michigan Medicine will begin delivering prescriptions to thousands of patients through a new drone delivery service . The hospital will provide the deliveries through a partnership with Zipline, a commercial drone delivery company.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Pregnant woman gets ultrasound

Clinicians and data science teams at Northwell Health in Lake Success, New York, are using artificial intelligence to close health equity gaps. For example, using AI tools, the health system is working to better forecast expectant mothers who could benefit from early intervention and specialized care to ensure safe childbirth — helping improve maternal health care for Black women.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

#ENDALZNOW poster

Banner Health is leading the fight against Alzheimer’s disease, bringing together top physicians and scientists to find better ways to prevent, delay and treat the disease, which some experts call one of the most important health care challenges in America. Based in Phoenix, Arizona, a popular retirement destination, the health system is seeing a rapidly growing rate of people with Alzheimer’s disease, which has been linked to COVID-19.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Bearded man in flannel shirt and puffy vest stands leaning over farm fence

When it became clear that farmers in rural Wisconsin were struggling with mental health issues, Marshfield Clinic Health System began a program to train members of its community — bankers, insurance agents and others — in spotting symptoms of depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts. They are now the front line of defense in a community that may find it difficult to seek help.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Hospital whiteboard in labor and delivery room

An innovative yet simple approach to improving perinatal care, called TeamBirth, was piloted by four U.S. hospitals including Saint Francis Hospital in Tulsa, Oklahoma. This teamwork and communication initiative is empowering laboring moms and supporting clinical care teams, while reducing the number of unnecessary cesarean deliveries and increasing patient satisfaction scores. TeamBirth now has been adopted by all Tulsa delivery hospitals and is being implemented across the country

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Poster: How likely are you to have cancer in your lifetime

Mercy Hospital in Oklahoma City is one of the first to use a break-through test to detect early signs of cancer. With a simple blood draw, the test can scan for more than 50 types of cancer, including those not commonly screened for today.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital - sequence genomes

Researchers with the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital Pediatric Cancer Genome Project investigate childhood cancers and incorporate findings into clinical trials at the hospital and internationally. The goal is to improve cure rates and long-term outcomes for several types of childhood cancers.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Three people posing for a photo, one dressed as a doctor, and the other two dressed formally.

Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans is using predictive analytics to improve patient safety, care delivery and health outcomes. For example, the health system applies machine learning to reduce health care-acquired Clostridioides difficile infections.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Patient lying down in hospital bed, connected to a extracorporeal membrane oxygenation machine

HCA Florida Healthcare uses lifesaving ECMO therapy on COVID-19 patient

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

Computerized graph of gene sequenced code being pointed at with hand holding a pen

Intermountain Healthcare is using precision genomics to personalize care and treatment for diseases like cancer, determine an individual’s risk for certain genetic conditions and identify how well an individual will respond to specific medications and dosage. The overall goal is to provide a better patient experience while helping to reduce costs.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

report cover image

OSF HealthCare, based in Peoria, Illinois, launched OSF Innovation to “embrace change and take on the largest health care challenges.” The team assessed what was needed to improve health outcomes and safety, increase access to care and make care more affordable.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

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The mission of the Technology & Innovation Development Office (TIDO) is to maximize the impact of Boston Children’s innovations on patient health while enhancing the research endeavor. The work translates the laboratory and clinical research excellence of Boston Children's Hospital into products for the public benefit. TIDO uses a multi-faceted approach to promote, support and develop research, technology and clinical innovations through the protection and licensing of intellectual property, investing in Boston Children's technologies, and establishing strong research and development partnerships with industry throughout the innovation-to-product life cycle.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

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The Cedars-Sinai Accelerator supports the growth and development of early-stage companies that are developing health care solutions to transform health care quality, efficiency and care delivery. Forty-seven companies from around the world have participated in the three-month program that offers mentorship and the ability to collaborate with clinicians, researchers and other Cedars-Sinai experts. The program is designed to improve care delivery by helping entrepreneurs bring their innovative technology products to market. The program is three months long and in addition to funding, offers mentorship from more than 300 leading clinicians and executives, access to Cedars-Sinai and exposure to a broad network of entrepreneurs and investors.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

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The Mercy Health Research & Innovation group operates as a research and innovation hub for the health system and is integral to organization’s mission to improve the health of communities, provide patients with the opportunity to participate in cutting edge research and support and grow clinical research and innovation with the priority to drive improvements in standard of care for patients.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

health workers practice on dummy

The Montefiore Einstein Center for Innovation in Simulation was established by Montefiore and Albert Einstein College of Medicine. The innovation center features state-of-the-art simulation technologies and is equipped for medical education and research, combining nursing schools and physician care to foster an environment that focuses on training procedures for health care professionals at all stages of their careers.

Innovation, Research and Quality Improvement

surgeons in operating theater

The MedStar Telehealth Innovation Center was established with the goal of supporting and coordinating telehealth services. It is housed within the MedStar Institute for Innovation (MI2), and is a system-wide resource that provides telehealth infrastructure, best practices, subject matter expertise, project implementation, and programmatic operational support. Even more important now during the pandemic, key areas that MTIC supports include the MedStar eVisit urgent care on demand platform, video visits, ED teletriage, and more.

Workforce

In this conversation, Carolyn Isabelle, director of workforce development at Dartmouth Health, discusses the health system's numerous approaches to recruitment, and the successful strategies that support a healthy and engaged workforce.

Workforce

Torrance Memorial Medical Center. Diverse high school students gather to observe a demonstration at Torrance Memorial.

Understanding the key role that the next generation can play in bridging the workforce gap, Torrance Memorial Medical Center recently hosted more than 180 local high school students to explore different health care career paths.

Workforce

Garrett Regional Medical Center, Jefferson Health, George Washington University Hospital. Video still features blurred image of backs of 4 female clinicians in white coats as they walk down a hospital hallway

Violence in the health care setting has implications beyond the injuries sustained by the dedicated men and women of our workforce. Health care leaders from AHA member hospitals and health systems talk about protecting health care workers from violence in this video series.

Workforce

UMass Memorial Health. Female clinician uses prosthetic arm to demonstrate IV insertion to a trainee

UMass Memorial is laser focused in addressing workforce challenges by creating new opportunities for professional growth and career advancement in health care. The Worcester, Mass.-based health system has created several new workforce development programs to help fill critical job vacancies and retain talented caregivers.

Workforce

In U.S. health care there has been a significant increase in the number of chief wellness officers (CWOs) employed by hospitals and health systems. CWOs are an essential part of a health care worker's mental and physical support structure, providing opportunities and resources whenever needed.

Workforce

In this conversation, Suzanne Bentley, M.D., chief wellness officer and director of simulation, innovation and research at the New York City Health and Hospitals Elmhurst, discusses the critical role that their peer support program played in employee mental health and the impact of building infrastructure focused on the well-being of staff.

Workforce

In this conversation, Kevin Stansbury, CEO of Lincoln Health, Debra Rudquist, president of Amery Hospital, and Karen Cheeseman, CEO of Mackinac Straits Health System, discuss the new ways they are retaining their current workforce, and how they are forging new paths to attract future generations of health care workers.

Workforce

In this conversation, experts from Kaiser Permanente and Mass General Brigham discuss how their organizations are using innovative workforce approaches to give their clinicians the resources and skills needed to thrive professionally and personally.

Workforce

In recent years, American health care has become acutely aware of the importance of well-being for its workers. To address the mental stresses of health care, Chicago’s Northwestern Medicine established the Scholars of Wellness program, focusing on understanding what well-being actually means, and how it can be woven into organizational culture. 

Workforce

In this conversation, Ellen Brzytwa, R.N., trustee at the Cleveland Clinic, discusses her mission of bringing more nurses into board positions, and how her own experience demonstrated that more hospital boards should have nurses as trustee members.

Workforce

Yale New Haven Hospital. Dr. Kristine Olson

In this conversation, Kristine Olson, M.D., chief wellness officer at Yale New Haven Hospital, discusses the steps to developing organization-wide wellness and well-being, and how these types of programs are creating positive results in their workforce.

Workforce

Meritus Health. Chief Strategy Officer Dave gives workforce testimonial

Dave, chief strategy officer at Meritus Health, shares how caring for people and impacting the community are what drives many people to work in health care.

Workforce

Providence Alaska Medical Center. Participant in RAIS program stands in hallway with another PAMC employee

Through a 10-year-old program in partnership with Catholic Social Services Refugee Assistance and Immigration Services (RAIS), PAMC has helped refugees from countries like Sudan, Afghanistan and Ukraine undergo training and secure employment and benefits in a variety of positions at the hospital.

Workforce

MaineHealth. A clinician adjusts an IV while other clinicians look on.

MaineHealth is among the hospitals and health systems with innovative programs that offer employment and professional development opportunities for community members and current team members — benefiting the community and helping the organization meet its workforce needs.

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