Rick Barr, M.D.
New awards honor patient care initiatives
Adrian Jarquin-Valdivia, M.D.
The Office of Risk Management recently awarded its first-ever Risk Management Awards to faculty and house staff at Vanderbilt University Medical Center who develop innovative patient care initiatives.
Later this year the office will also present awards to a member of VUMC's nursing staff, and also an employee award.
The award recipients are selected on the basis of improving patient care safety, developing changes in treatment protocols to improve standardization of care and developing enhanced educational and training opportunities for colleagues.
This year's faculty award winners are; Rick Barr, M.D., co-medical director of the Monroe Carell Jr. Vanderbilt Children's Hospital Pediatric Critical Care Unit, and Adrian Jarquin-Valdivia, M.D., assistant professor of Neurology, Anesthesiology and Medicine.
Barr was selected for his assistance with the development of both the ventilator and nitric oxide weaning protocols in the PCCU. He also leads the monthly Morbidity & Mortality meetings and is spearheading Children's Hospital's portion of a multi-center study on sedation practices in PCCUs.
Jarquin-Valdivia was selected for developing the Stroke Center Web site and for helping to establish the Stroke fellowship. He has also created multiple evidence-based order sets for acute stroke, TIA and hemorrhage, and has developed tracking measures for external ventricular drains.
This year's house staff award winners are Titus Daniels, M.D., a second-year fellow in Infectious Diseases, and Stephan Russ, M.D., third-year resident in Emergency Medicine.
Daniels was selected for his involvement in creating StarPanel templates for Infectious Disease. He also volunteers to assist with complex occurrences, such as when he volunteered to phone dozens of patients to inform and educate them regarding their exposure to a communicable disease.
Russ was selected for his work surrounding the treatment of pneumonia in the ED, which included creating an “Antibiotic in Pneumonia” advisory. He is currently developing an automated quality assurance data system, which will be able to easily answer any questions using merged data from multiple sources.