Mountain States Cardiovascular Health strives to substantially reduce cardiovascular disease while providing excellent medical care to patients.
Mountain States Cardiovascular Health was created to diagnose, treat and rehabilitate children and adults while meeting their physical and emotional needs.
Our focus is in three critical areas: education, early intervention and a technologically sophisticated facility with expert cardiologists and vascular specialists.
In November 2010, Mountain States Health Alliance launched the HeartCoach. The HeartCoach is a mobile screening unit housed in a renovated recreational vehicle that offers a preventive approach to health through screenings to identify an individual’s risk for heart/vascular disease and stroke. The purchase of the HeartCoach was made possible through the efforts of the Mountain States Foundation and the dedication of the funds from the Dragon Boat Festival in September 2010 to this fundraising effort. Prior to the establishment of the HeartCoach, MSHA operated a screening center off Princeton Road in Johnson City. Outreach efforts with the center were accommodated through staff utilizing personal vehicles to transport equipment and supplies. This limited outreach efforts, as the system required inefficiencies to accommodate packing vehicles, unpacking at sites, and repacking for the trip home. This didn’t enable the center to effectively penetrate the service region.
The idea for a mobile screening unit had been something that the Cardiovascular Strategic Service Unit and the screening center had established as a long-term goal. With the help of the Foundation, that goal became a reality in November 2010. The HeartCoach travels throughout the MSHA service area in Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia. This mobile unit now enables MSHA to focus on prevention and detection of cardiovascular disease rather than just treatment. Over the past year, the HeartCoach has been successful at detecting disease in patients across the service region who would have otherwise suffered a potentially life-threatening event. These patients now have been successfully treated and have been able to actively resume their daily lives. A screening on the HeartCoach includes blood pressure, height, weight, waist circumference, cholesterol screening and vascular scans. A screening takes about 45 minutes and all results are reviewed with a health educator after the process.
The success of the HeartCoach prompted Mountain States Cardiovascular services to look at its current community outreach programs and access for improvement opportunities. The HeartCoach increased community awareness through its visibility and the Strategic Service Unit wanted to complement that effort. Through research, MEGA Heart was identified as an exciting way to bring visibility, outreach and education to the MSHA service region. MEGA Heart is the world’s only portable, inflatable, walk-through heart exhibit. The MEGA Heart provides a highly interactive educational experience that increases people’s awareness of America’s number one killer: heart disease. Visitors can step inside the human heart, learn about cardiovascular functions, observe examples of various types of heart disease, and see displays of some of the latest medical treatments for heart problems. The inflatable is 21 feet in length, 15 feet in width and 12 feet in height. The MEGA Heart was presented to the Mountain States Foundation and approved with funds to promote cardiovascular and health awareness to the community. Education will be targeted specifically at local and area schools along with other outreach events sponsored by Mountain States Cardiovascular Health.
Mountain States Cardiovascular Health has also maintained a strong relationship with the Foundation through fundraising, grants and incentive programs with vendors that provide support for a cardiovascular educational fund. This fund allows team members to attend national conferences on technology and clinical advances, which might not otherwise be possible.
For more information, e-mail Cindy Salyer at salyercb@msha.com.
Funding Priorities
- mobile screening bus $250,000
- mobile echocardiogram equipment $80,000
- cholestech $4,200 - desired quantity: 2
- fax machine Ricoh LF312 $840
- copier Ricoh MP2500SPF $5,073
- laptop computer Lenovo T500 Thinkpad plus 4 licenses $9,894 - desired quantity:
- printer HP LaserJet P4015N $2,300 - desired quantity: 2
- automatic blood pressure cuff Dinamap CaresScape V100$10,740 - desired quantity: 4
- handheld doppler Huntleigh Doppler 8MZH $2,400 - desired quantity: 2
- bone density screening equipment GE Achilles Insight $18,000
This list includes the bus and related equipment for screenings, record keeping, transmission of records.