Paris Heart Centre

The 2003 HSJ awards took place in October in London. There were originally 824 entries for 14 different awards. One was for 'Improvement in Performance Management' the winner being the NW Quality Improvment Programme in Cardiac Interventions - which is made up of four centres : Paris Heart Centre (MRI), Cardiothoracic Centre - Liverpool, Wythenshawe Hospital and Blackpool Victoria.

The Programme monitors the effects of Cardiac Surgery on patients and measures their quality of life. It was started in response to the Bristol Inquiry; The programme has developed an Audit standard for Cardiac Surgical mortality in a number of ways, including process control charts to monitor the effect of change in clinical practice on patients and continuous patient follow-up to measure quality of life. The project fits in well with many of the targets in the government's national service framework for coronary Heart disease. Specific systems have been developed to follow up patients and access their quality of life post surgery so that each healthcare professional can follow each part of the patient's journey. It has been active in involving patients and getting them to comment on services they are receiving.

Representatives from the MRI included : Mr D. Keenan, Cardiac Surgeon, Suzanne Chaisty, Senior Data Co-ordinator MHC and David Geldard, patient representative who was operated on by Geir Grotte in 1995.