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A year after Jackson Hospital in Montgomery, Alabama opened the region’s first formalized outpatient program for wound healing, the hospital has realized a greater-than-expected increase in healing rates, exceeded its expected revenues and has provided world class care that was previously unavailable anywhere in the region.
In the past, patients seeking specialized wound care therapies had to travel more than 100 miles for treatment. Now, Jackson Hospital’s Wound Care Center® offers these patients state-of-the-art hyperbaric oxygen therapy, surgical debridements, skin grafts and other advanced treatments. With the establishment of this center, Jackson Hospital has achieved an 88% healing rate, surpassing the hospital’s projections by 13%.
"We’ve been very impressed with Diversified Services," says hospital CEO Don Henderson. The hospital appreciates the thorough training process offered by Diversified Clinical Services, as well as the integration of the Wound Care Center into the hospital’s overall operations. According to Henderson, "We feel that Diversified is a part of our facility instead of being a remote contracted service."
Community Need
With no advanced wound care facility in central Alabama and a large aging population with a high incidence of hypertension, vascular disease and diabetes, Jackson Hospital’s surgical team saw a significant need for expanding their wound care capabilities. To address this need, a partnership with Diversified Clinical Services enabled the hospital to integrate the necessary equipment and a formal clinical pathway to guide the healing process.
Explains General Surgeon Dr. Randy Cook, "We are the only alternative for somebody that might benefit from hyperbaric oxygen. That modality didn’t exist until we got involved with Diversified Clinical Services."
The Results
After their first year, Jackson Hospital has seen a 40 percent increase in the total number of wound care patients and also a 40 percent increase in net revenues. Diversified Clinical Services is "more than meeting our expectations from a financial point of view," says Henderson. "Diversified brings us an enormous number of resources that we just hadn’t had before … by having the knowledge base and the experience base and the clinical advisors that we have with Diversified, it makes it much easier for us"
- Randy Cook, MD General Surgeon |
