Three areas of Schneck Medical Center recently were recognized during the Seymour hospital’s board of directors meetings.

Amy Pettit, vice president of patient care services and chief nursing officer at Schneck, highlighted the honors.

First, Schneck Home Services was recognized by Strategic Healthcare Programs as a Premier Performer for achieving an overall patient satisfaction score that ranked in the top 5% of all eligible SHP clients for the 2019 calendar year.

The annual SHPBest Award acknowledges home health agencies that consistently provide high-quality service to their patients. Award recipients were determined by reviewing and ranking the overall satisfaction score for more than 3,000 home health providers.

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With the largest Home Health CAHPS benchmark in the nation, SHP is in a unique position to identify and recognize organizations that have made patient satisfaction a priority and have been rewarded for their efforts with high marks on the Home Health CAHPS survey.

"Super excited about that and the great work that they are doing over in Home Services," Pettit said.

"To be in that 5% is quite an achievement," board President Rick Smith said.

Home health care is devoted to bringing professional health services into people’s homes where they feel most comfortable, according to Schneck’s website. Physical, speech and occupational therapies, home health aides, dietetic/nutritional services and medical/social services are available to those recuperating from illness or learning to cope with chronic disease and disability.

Denise Swegles, director of Schneck Home Services, said she’s extremely proud of her team members.

"Their expertise and teamwork in caring for our patients have earned this distinction," she said. "We continually strive to provide quality compassionate care to all our clients. It is most gratifying when the quality of care we provide improves the health and lives of the community we serve."

Second, Pettit said Schneck has been granted a three-year term of accreditation for providing nursing continuing professional development contact hours. That came from the Ohio Nurses Association, which is an accredited provider by the American Nurse Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation.

"When nurses get specialty certifications or specialty training, they need these specific contact hours in order to maintain those certifications," Pettit said. "Because we are now a provider of those hours, we can create education and add those contact hours to that education for both nurses at the bedside and also advanced practice nurses."

Pettit said she is very excited about this accreditation.

"We want our nurses to be certified in that specialty area, and this helps to allow for that," she said. "It really does also save the organization funds because we can do the education here and add that continuing education without the travel."

Smith said the accreditation will be attractive for nurses who want to come to Schneck to work and those already on staff.

Finally, the American College of Radiology granted the hospital’s diagnostic imaging department with a three-year accreditation in nuclear medicine.

That’s a branch of imaging that uses small amounts of radioactive material to diagnose and treat cancer, heart disease and other abnormalities, Pettit said.

"This accreditation is really the gold seal representing the highest level of image quality and patient safety, so I just wanted to share the great work that diagnostic imaging is doing," she said.

"That’s going to be exciting," Smith said. "It’s something that’s sorely needed here."