A groundbreaking program, in place now for more than a year at each of the Baptist Health System hospitals, is saving precious time in diagnosing and treating patients suffering a heart attack. Baptist Health System is the first and only system in San Antonio to implement “Heart Alert,” a program that in most cases gets heart attack patients into the cath lab for life-saving treatment in under an hour… well under the national standard of 90-minutes.

“The process can best be compared to a “NASCAR” style response to treating heart attacks,” said Bill Waechter, who helped implement Heart Alert at Baptist Health System. “Like a well-trained pit crew, the Heart Alert process is a focused collaboration which creates a safe, fast and efficient, but not rushed, method of getting a patient to the hospital and receiving interventional treatment. It’s the integration of care between EMS and hospital emergency and cath lab departments that makes this work.”

The Heart Alert program is part of Baptist Health System’s Chest Pain Center Accreditation. Baptist is the first and only health system in San Antonio to receive Chest Pain Center Accreditation for its commitment to protocols which improve patient outcomes in the treatment of heart attacks.

To recognize the amazing achievements of the Heart Alert program, this month physicians and nurses from emergency departments and cath labs at each of the Baptist hospitals, EMS and AirLife personnel, and the patients who have benefited from the Heart Alert program will gather for “Heart Alert Celebration – Saving Seconds, Saving Lives”. The event will shine the spotlight on the medical experts who have made Heart Alert a success and will honor the patients who have experienced the difference Heart Alert makes.