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Mercy Hospital Receives Critical Care Excellence Award
COON RAPIDS, Minn. 05/31/2005--Allina’s Mercy Hospital has been awarded the 2005 Beacon Award for Critical Care Excellence from the American Association of Critical Care Nurses (AACN). Mercy’s Intensive Care Unit is the first critical care unit in Minnesota and the Upper Midwest to be awarded the Beacon.
“The Beacon Award is for nursing care, but it reflects the excellence of the entire staff,” said Louise Jacobs, RN, MS, CCRN, Mercy’s ICU manager. “We have very low staff turnover, and 36 percent of our nurses are CCRNs.” Mercy’s ICU was one of ten critical care units at nine U.S. hospitals to receive the award.
“Beacon Award winners have set an example that other hospitals can follow. These units and their staffs are true leaders in critical care and we are honored to recognize them with this award,” said Kathy McCauley, president, AACN.
The Beacon Award recognizes critical care units for exhibiting the highest quality standards in nurse recruitment and retention, patient outcomes, staff training, healthy work environments, leadership, and evidence-based practice and research. Criteria for winning a Beacon Award include:
- Recognized excellence in the intensive care environments in which nurses work and critically ill patients are cared for;
- Recognized excellence of the highest quality measures, processes, structures and outcomes based upon evidence;
- Recognized excellence in collaboration, communication and partnerships that support the value of healing and humane environments;
- Developing a program that contributes to actualization of AACN’s mission, vision and values.
Mercy & Unity Hospitals, located in Coon Rapids and Fridley, are non-profit hospitals that serve the northern Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area. The hospitals, which are part of Allina Hospitals & Clinics, cared for 250,000 patients in 2004. More information is located at www.mercyunity.com.
The American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN) is the largest specialty nursing organization in the world, serving 100,000 nurses. Complete information about AACN is available on the Internet at www.aacn.org.
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