Collaboration in Action

A team at Horizon Health in Paris, IL, wanted to improve patient care for specific conditions such as Sepsis, Stroke, Heart Failure, and CAD NSTEMI/STEMI, and achieve high scores in the AHA Get With The Guidelines (GWTG) and CMS Core Measures to exceed state and national benchmarks and earn GWTG recognition for the hospital.

The project began with chart reviews, followed by the implementation of real-time treatment changes. Key strategies included:

• Using overhead pages for Code Stroke and Code Sepsis
• Creating text groups for timely reviews
• Developing guidance sheets for nursing staff
• Holding educational meetings

The project also involved updating documentation sheets, electronic health records, and provider order sets, rewarding staff for their input, and adding specific measures to daily quality huddles.

The project produced significant improvements in health outcomes, with incremental increases in composite scores for Stroke, Heart Failure, CAD STEMI, and CAD NSTEMI from 2022 to 2025.

Employee engagement also improved, and the hospital received multiple GWTG awards in 2024. Overall, the project integrated with the hospital’s mission, vision, and values and became an ongoing part of the organization’s strategic operations plan.

Memorial Hospital in Chester initiated a Child Life Services program designed to support pediatric patients and their families within a rural healthcare setting. The program aimed to mitigate fear and anxiety during medical visits, enhance communication between healthcare providers and patients, provide developmentally appropriate preparation for medical procedures, and offer professional child life support at no cost, thereby improving the overall patient and family experience.

The target audience for this program includes children aged 0–21 and their families across various hospital settings. The program aims to enhance emotional and psychological support, thereby increasing cooperation and trust in local healthcare services.

As a rural critical access hospital, the Memorial team recognized a significant gap in supportive services for pediatric patients. Families in the community previously had to travel long distances to access child life services, often adding financial and emotional strain. Children frequently experienced heightened fear during emergency, outpatient, or surgical visits, which created barriers to care and placed additional stress on staff and parents.

The need for a structured child life program was clear to help children feel safe, understood, and engaged in their own care. By offering this service at no cost to families — and through the expertise of a Certified Child Life Specialist — Memorial has removed another barrier to care, creating equitable access to professional child life support for all children in our region.

The program’s impact and benefits have been significant. It has led to improved patient satisfaction, reduced fear during medical procedures, alleviated staff workload, increased family trust and loyalty, and bolstered the hospital’s reputation as an innovative provider of rural healthcare.

The Youth Wellness Community Outreach project at Fairfield Memorial Hospital was created to increase communication and engagement with younger residents in the area.

Initiated in 2016 and in partnership with Village InCK (the Egyptian Health Department’s Integrated Care for Kids program), the program provides school and sports physicals to children from pre-kindergarten through college at no out-of-pocket cost.

The partnership with Village InCK has enabled Fairfield providers to screen and identify children who may benefit from the program, increasing the number of physicals conducted annually, reducing injuries, and helping more patients establish relationships with primary care physicians.

St. Joseph Memorial Hospital in Murphysboro developed an educational program to address the growing health concern of teen vaping, as identified in its Community Health Needs Assessment. This initiative provides students with interactive, evidence-based education on the risks and consequences of vaping.

The program was developed through a collaboration between nurses and Murphysboro High School, integrating a vaping prevention and cessation curriculum into the freshman health classes. The curriculum includes formal education on the chemicals involved, the health risks, and relevant laws, along with hands-on demonstrations and interactive activities designed to engage students effectively.

What began as a one-time classroom presentation has grown into a regional prevention initiative. By the 2024 school year, the nurses were invited to present at four additional schools, with some requesting sessions for all grade levels, not just freshmen. For the 2025 school year, the program expanded further, reaching six rural high schools and middle schools across Southern Illinois.

The impact has included:

• Student engagement: Teens report sharing handouts with friends and family and asking questions such as whether quitting now will allow their lungs to heal—demonstrating both personal connection and behavior change.
• Teacher feedback: Educators have shared that they learned new information themselves, leaving them better prepared to guide student conversations about vaping.
• Community reach: What started as a single-class initiative has evolved into a community-wide prevention effort, with ripple effects extending beyond school walls. Looking ahead, this project is building the foundation for long-term health improvement by encouraging early prevention, reducing future chronic disease burden, and strengthening partnerships between schools and healthcare providers.

The NARCAN Vending Kiosk Initiative from Northwestern Medicine Valley West Hospital in Sandwich is a public health project aimed at reducing opioid-related deaths by providing free and anonymous access to naloxone (NARCAN) on a hospital campus. The goals of the project include increasing community access to life-saving overdose reversal medication, addressing mental health and substance abuse priorities, and reducing stigma and barriers to obtaining NARCAN.

The hospital serves a rural community significantly impacted by opioid misuse and overdose. Despite the availability of NARCAN through pharmacies and clinics, stigma, cost, and lack of awareness remain significant barriers. The kiosk offers an anonymous, no-cost solution to meet community needs.

The target audience includes hospital staff, patients, visitors, and community members who may not otherwise have access to NARCAN. The project empowers individuals to act in emergencies, potentially saving lives without judgment or delay.

Since its implementation in April 2025, the kiosk has distributed more than 190 NARCAN units, increased awareness and education about opioid overdose prevention, strengthened community trust in the hospital, and engaged staff through education and outreach. The project aligns with the State of Illinois Overdose Action Plan and promotes social equity, prevention, and harm reduction 14.

Key benefits include improved health outcomes, reduced stigma around substance abuse and mental health, increased community engagement, and empowerment of staff and community members. The initiative exemplifies innovation, compassion, and responsiveness to community needs, making a measurable difference in the lives of those served.

The Safety and Emergency Management Program at Horizon Health in Paris, Ill., was designed to enhance the hospital’s, its staff, and the community’s safety and preparedness. Over the past year, Horizon Health has implemented several initiatives to create a safer environment. Key initiatives include:

• Daily Leadership Safety Huddles: Structured safety huddles every morning to identify and address safety concerns, reinforce accountability, and foster communication across departments.
• Executive Leadership Engagement: Active involvement of the leadership team in emergency preparedness, elevating the visibility and execution of safety initiatives.
• Emergency Preparedness Committee: Regular meetings to assess hazard vulnerabilities, plan and review emergency exercises, and ensure alignment with regulatory standards and community needs.
• Robust Education & Training: Ongoing education through TEEX (Texas A&M Engineering Extension Service) trainings, offering hands-on, scenario-based learning.
• Engaging Staff Through Innovative Ideas: Creative training methods like emergency preparedness scavenger hunts and interactive simulations to enhance staff participation.
• Centralized Online Emergency Resource Hub: An internal hub on the Intranet housing all emergency policies, procedures, and critical resources.
• Community Collaboration: Strong partnerships with local emergency management agencies, law enforcement, fire departments, and EMS for coordinated efforts in planning for events with large crowds.

These initiatives have led to measurable improvements in organizational readiness, staff engagement, and cross-sector collaboration. The program has also led to a significant increase in employee engagement scores in the Safety in the Workplace category, rising from below 50% to over 85%.

Memorial Hospital and Clinics has launched the Memorial Medical Clinic Mobile, a behavioral health mobile unit staffed by licensed behavioral health professionals from Memorial Medical Clinics, including Licensed Clinical Social Workers, to provide mental health services directly to children in Hancock County, Illinois. This initiative addresses the barriers to accessing mental health care in rural areas by delivering services on school campuses and at community events.

The primary objective of the mobile clinic is to expand access to behavioral health services for rural youth who face geographical, transportation, or scheduling challenges. The clinic promotes early intervention for issues such as anxiety, depression, and trauma.

This initiative addresses community disparities by responding to the higher rates of mental distress, poverty, suicide, and transportation challenges in Hancock County. By embedding stigma-free, accessible care within schools, the project aims to improve children’s mental health outcomes.
The program offers numerous benefits to the community, including:

• Improved student mental health and coping skills
• Reduced stigma around mental health
• Increased attendance and performance in schools
• Deeper family and school engagement in the care process
• Expanded community outreach through events and partnerships
• Wraparound support — the mobile unit also provides children with essential resources such as hygiene products, school supplies, and food, helping meet basic needs that directly affect their mental health and learning
• Elevated employee morale and organizational pride

The mobile unit has demonstrated significant impact and growth, completing more than 700 counseling appointments with improved attendance rates (84%-89% compared to 62% in traditional settings). The unit has reached more patients than other providers, extending its outreach during the summer months to 212 children.

The Healthfest event at Carle Richland Memorial Hospital in Olney is a cornerstone of the organization’s commitment to the community. The Healthfest Reimagined team has transformed the event by integrating Discount Lab services into the Epic system. This modernization effort replaces outdated manual processes with digital workflows, thereby enhancing patient care and operational efficiency. The initiative enables real-time registration, order placement, and expedited delivery of lab results, ultimately improving the overall healthcare experience for both the community and staff.

Embedding Healthfest’s discount lab services workflows into the Epic system integration facilitates real-time registration and order placement, effectively removing barriers to care and reducing inefficiencies. The previous paper-based system caused delays in results, increased staff workload, and led to billing errors. A digital transformation was necessary to align with patient-centered care and efficiency goals.

The target audience for this project includes community members attending Healthfest, who benefit from timely lab results, and staff members, who are empowered through streamlined workflows and accurate billing. This helps foster a more compassionate care environment.
Health improvements are evident as patients now receive lab results within hours via MyCarle, enabling quicker health decisions and earlier interventions, which can reduce complications in preventive care.

Cost savings have been realized through the transition to an integrated Epic workflow, which eliminated printing and postage costs, reduced overtime and administrative hours, and minimized billing errors. These savings allow for the reallocation of resources to patient services.
Employee engagement has been enhanced through cross-departmental collaboration, which has improved staff efficiency and morale by simplifying workflows and reducing post-event stress. This highlights the importance of teamwork and innovation.

Finally, the project has strengthened community trust and enhanced Carle Richland’s reputation by demonstrating a commitment to accessible, high-quality care through a modernized, patient-centered Healthfest experience.

Horizon Health in Paris, Illinois, in an effort to provide patients with top-notch care, monitors many performance metrics not required for critical access hospitals. The information is plugged into a dashboard to provide real-time data on various quality and patient safety measures, enabling leadership, medical staff, and the board to track progress and make informed decisions.

Initially designed for leadership to access real-time performance data, this project has seen the dashboards grow from 1 to 4 pages and evolve to include medical staff, board members, and employees. This evolution fosters a sense of connection to community healthcare outcomes.

The impact and benefits of the dashboards are significant. They have driven continuous quality improvement, accountability, and transparency.
The project has put Horizon Health into the top ten percentile scores for Sepsis nationally, and the organization received multiple GWTG awards for 2024, including:

• AHA Commitment to Quality Award
• AHA GWTG Rural Heart Failure Rural CAD NSTE-ACS Silver Award (you can only achieve Silver in your first year, not Gold)
• AHA GWTG Rural CAD STEMI Silver Award (again, you can only receive Silver in your first year)
• AHA GWTG Rural CAD STEMI Referring Bronze Plus Award (for a referring center that refers patients to a hospital that completes PCI interventions)
• AHA GWTG Rural Stroke Gold Award
• AHA GWTG Stroke Silver Plus (among all hospitals, not rural only)

Rochelle Community Hospital (RCH) worked with Sinnissippi Centers. This local behavioral health organization has partnered with RCH for crisis management of emergency outpatients and has collaborated on referrals to RCH to minimize wait times for follow-up mental health services. Along with Sinnissippi, partners from Rochelle police, fire, and clergy worked with the RCH workgroup to aid in identifying and immediately intervening with known community members who require behavioral health services.

The Rochelle Community Health (RCH) Behavioral Health Clinic is an outpatient service dedicated to providing local behavioral health counseling and medication management to clients aged 12 and older. The clinic aims to address the scarcity of mental health services in rural areas by offering compassionate, comprehensive care and collaborating with community partners to improve accessibility and reduce wait times.
The clinic’s community partners collaborate to manage crises, facilitate referrals, and provide immediate intervention for community members requiring behavioral health services. The clinic employs an Advanced Practice Nurse Practitioner, a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, and a medical assistant to deliver counseling and medication management, working closely with providers and partners to serve both those seeking help and those in need.

Rochelle undertook this project in response to the significant shortage of mental health resources in the community, particularly in rural settings where cost, transportation, and long wait times limit access to care. Since its inception, client visits have increased by 50%, with positive feedback on reduced appointment wait times and local service availability. The clinic has enhanced care convenience, shortened follow-up intervals, and strengthened safety nets through improved communication among partners.