REGIONAL STROKE COORDINATOR RN- NEURO INTERVENTIONAL LAB in JONESBORO, Arkansas at Saint Bernards Medical Center

The Regional Stroke Coordinator works with the St. Bernards Medical Center's acute inpatient and outpatient stroke teams, coordinators and Stroke Medical Director to ensure that processes are refined and extended to the facilities and providers across Northeast Arkansas and Southeast Missouri.

The role is that of a Clinical Operational extension of the SBMC Stroke Program Medical Director/Administrator.

The Regional Stroke Coordinator standardizes care models across the region, through process improvement he/she affects how stroke patients are recognized, treated, transferred, provided options of intervention, receives follow up care, while building referral relationships with physicians and APRNs in outlying communities. The Regional Stroke Coordinator incorporates data from the monthly Stroke Committee report and the quarterly regional dashboard to improve processes, care, quality and access across the Northeast AR and Southeast Missouri Region. As a result of the Regional Stroke Coordinators unique relationship with the outlying regional facilities, the Regional Stroke Coordinator will also serve as a clinical liaison between SBMC, and referring facilities, and between providers.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

Duties fall into five areas; the first two carry the most weight in year one.

Assist with Stroke process development at SBMC (acute inpatient and outpatient)

• Partners with the Stroke Medical Director to design and maintain evidence-based protocols, pathways and order sets across the region: ED stroke alert, Rapid AI, Pulsara, IV thrombolysis, thrombectomy triage, inpatient stroke unit care, dysphagia screening, VTE prophylaxis, secondary prevention, discharge and transitions.
• Assist the referring partners to build the outpatient continuum for the region: post-discharge stroke clinic follow-up, TIA rapid-evaluation pathway, rehab referral, and 30/90-day follow-up calls.
• Aligns all processes with current AHA/ASA guidelines and certification standards (Joint Commission or DNV), and takes a leadership role as it relates to readiness for Comprehensive Stroke Certification survey.
• Works with Meditech/IT on order sets, best-practice alerts, and documentation templates for the region as well as assist facilities that are non-medictech in the development of the EHR templates for stroke.

• Maps each outlying facility's stroke capability (CT, CTA, telestroke, thrombolytic availability, transfer agreements) and assigns a role in a tiered regional system.
• Deploys standardized tools to outlying sites: stroke recognition, door-in-door-out targets, thrombolytic-and-transfer protocols, and one-call transfer access through Pulsara with AI enhancement by Rapid.
• Partners with EMS agencies on prehospital stroke scales, large-vessel-occlusion destination guidance, and prenotification through Pulsara and Rapid AI.
• Provides education and competency support to outlying ED, nursing and EMS staff.
• Serves as a SBMC expert resource for Rapid AI and Pulsara.
• Assist the Vice President of Patient Services to ensure that SBMC has a always open status, 24/7 for stroke care.

• Serves as the primary SBMC stroke process improvement contact for outlying medical centers, physicians and APRNs.
• Makes routine site visits, closes the loop on every transferred patient (outcome feedback to the referring team), and works closely with the Regional Transfer Director to define and manage transfer barriers.
• Grows referral relationships for acute transfers, outpatient stroke and TIA follow-up, and neurovascular services; tracks referral volume by county and provider.

• Plans and leads monthly or quarterly Regional Stroke Updates for outlying facilities: data review, case reviews, guideline changes, and education (CE credit where possible). Facilitates case review at the Regional Meeting by the SBMC Stroke Medical Director.

• Reviews and utilizes the stroke data abstracted and submitted to the registry to identify patterns and opportunities for improvement (e.g., AHA Get With The Guidelines–Stroke).
• Runs performance-improvement projects, case reviews and fallout analysis for the region; refers clinical outliers to peer review through the Stroke Medical Director.
• Develops and manages the business plans, and return-on-investment for regional growth in neurovascular services.
• Performs other duties as assigned.

Working Conditions

Based at SBMC in Jonesboro with frequent regional travel to outlying facilities across primary and tertiary counties (estimate 40% of time). Primarily weekday business hours, with flexibility for evening Regional Stroke Updates, survey readiness, and occasional on-call or stroke alert response, at the Stroke Medical Directors’ request. Office and clinical environments; standard precautions and PPE as required.