Horizon Health Employee Receives State Award

Samantha McCarty, critical care manager at Horizon Health, recently received the 2018 EMS Professional of the Year Award from the Illinois Rural Health Association (IRHA). The award was presented in conjunction with the organization’s Annual Educational Conference held in Champaign.

The award honors McCarty for her outstanding contributions to rural health. Among them are her positive impact regarding the opioid epidemic in east central Illinois, the creation of a new ambulance service at Horizon Health, and her work to improve patient satisfaction at the organization.

Specifically, McCarty, BSN, RN, PHRN, was honored for the following:

• Supplying Edgar County law enforcement officers with Narcan, an agent that prevents/reverses the effects of opiates. Her work included training responders on how to use Narcan as part of the community CARE Coalition (Community Addiction Response Education). Narcan has greatly improved survival rates and has reduced the long-term effects of overdose in Edgar County.

• Starting a hospital-owned ambulance service, which began April 17 of this year. The new Horizon Health EMS service is intended to better address the full continuum of care for patients. The service is licensed for two advanced life support ambulances for both emergent and non-emergent transports. They are able to assist and provide back-up to outlying communities as needed.

• Helping increase patient satisfaction scores for nursing in the emergency department to a consistent level of more than 90 percent satisfaction.

McCarty also initiated the process for Paris Community Hospital to become recognized as an Acute Stroke-Ready Hospital in Illinois, a designation it has held since 2015.