Mercy Hospital Springfield, part of the fifth largest Catholic health system in the nation, has been awarded a three-year term of accreditation from the Global Healthcare Accreditation Program for its Medical Destination Program. The Global Healthcare Accreditation (GHA) Program is a healthcare accreditation program designed for healthcare organizations seeking to elevate the quality, patient experience and excellence of care they provide to medical travel, medical tourism and/or international patients.
Over the past 4 years, Mercy Health System continued to expand its Medical Destination program that historically focused on large self-insured employers in the United States, including Walmart, Lowes, JetBlue and McKesson.
"This experience is invaluable to Mercy on our journey to expand our medical travel and medical tourism business. We are excited for the future and our continued relationship with the GHA Program," stated Jen Albers, Director of Mercy Spine Center, Pain Management, Headache Management and Medical Destinations.
Established in 2009, the GHA program focuses on an organization's core competencies and compliance levels to ensure it is fully committed to providing safe and efficient patient care throughout the entire medical travel cycle. The program offers four distinguished areas of accreditation: Hospital (24-hour setting), Ambulatory (non-24-hour setting), Diagnostic, and Laboratory. As part of the unique GHA program, healthcare organizations will be able to obtain not only knowledge on medical travel exemplar practices, but also unique business solutions that provide value for an organization in any stage of development. GHA aims to enable each accredited organization to achieve better process and better performance on a daily basis.
"Mercy is a leader in precision, high quality healthcare. The organization has a systemic passion to always service excellence and the dignity of each individual patient as its highest priority – this character trait of Mercy co-workers will allow the Medical Destination program to expand its global footprint. GHA Leadership looks forward to Mercy's future in the international medical travel industry," stated Karen Timmons, Chief Executive Officer, Global Healthcare Association.
About Mercy: Mercy Springfield Communities is comprised of Mercy Hospital Springfield, an 866-bed referral center; an orthopedic hospital; a rehab hospital; a children's hospital; five regional hospitals in Lebanon, Aurora, Cassville, Mountain View, Missouri and Berryville, Arkansas; and Mercy Clinic, a physician clinic with nearly 700 doctors and locations throughout the region. It is part of Mercy, named one of the top five large health systems in 2016 by Truven, which serves millions annually. Mercy includes 45 acute care and specialty (heart, children's, orthopedic and rehab) hospitals, more than 700 physician practices and outpatient facilities, 40,000 co-workers and more than 2,000 Mercy Clinic physicians in Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma. Mercy also has outreach ministries in Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. Mercy's Medical Destination Program manages the traveling patient program for all of its facilities.
GHA Standards Accredited by ISQUA
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