The Emergency Department staff at Rockdale Medical Center recently received the LifePoint Hospitals' 2012 Operational Excellence Award for Best Emergency Department Operations. The award recognizes significant achievement in key performance measures around quality, wait times, time between treatments, and time to discharge - all of which affect a patient's experience and overall satisfaction.

From 2011 to 2012, the number of patients visiting the Emergency Department soard to record numbers - almost 50,000 patients in 2012, a 14 percent increase over 2011. But along with growing volume, Rockdale Medical Center's ED saw patient satisfaction scores rise by more than 20 percent and the department achieved higher quality scores.

Chief Nursing Officer at Rockdale Medical Center Deborah Almauhy credits the success to the ED staff's Team Triage approach, which reduces the amount of time it takes for a patient to move from the waiting room to being assessed and treated. With numerous staff members, and physicians involved in patient care, provider-to-provider communication impacts the effectiveness and timeliness of the process.

Almauhy said, "Even with the increase in patients seen, Rockdale Medical Center has one of the highest ED patient satisfaction scores out of the 56 LifePoint hospitals."

Rockdale Medical Center is a 138-bed acute-care hospital that is fully accredited by The Joint Commission which evaluates hospital patient care for quality, safety and value. Rockdale Medical Center is owned by LifePoint Hospitals®, which owns more than 50 community hospitals nationwide.