Stroke Alert Team Paper

The implementation of a Stroke Alert Team at St. Vincent’s Medical Center is a cost-effective way to ensure patients who present with symptoms of an acute stroke are quickly assessed and treated. It also assures that the organization will continue to sustain high performance for the stroke Core Measure sets. The Stroke Coordinator will play a vital role in the workflow discovery and the plan to develop an interprofessional Stroke Alert Team. The Stroke Alert Team members include: A designated ED MD and Charge RN, the ED Radiologist, the Neurologist on call, and the Stroke Coordinator. EMS will notify the ED of a possible stroke. Once the diagnosis of a stroke is made, the ED MD initiates a Stroke Alert. The operator announces overhead Stroke Alert, and announces the location of the patient. The operator …show more content…
Education for the team will be provided by the Stroke Coordinator, and each team member will receive one-hour of classroom training, followed by two scenarios in the simulation lab to assure the team understand their roles and responsibilities. Additional training will be provided for the hospital operators since they are an integral part of the notification process. Hospital wide education will be in the format of an email to all staff, posters, and presented at the medical and nursing grand rounds. Communication is one of the biggest challenges when implementing a Stroke Alert Team. When there are multiple team members to message, and required to assemble quickly, there are inherent risks for delay. There can also be a lack of urgency, since clinical staff may believe a Stroke Alert isn’t as urgent as a code. After the formation of the Stroke Alert Team the Stroke Coordinator will continue to be responsible for stroke Core Measure data tracking, however there will be addition data points collected for