By JIM CRAIG

I make appearances around the country, delivering motivational speeches, teamwork building seminars, and sales and marketing coaching.  My messages and lessons meld experience and success from playing on one of the highest achieving sports teams of all time and more than 20 years as a sales and marketing strategist and executive.

I teach that among the most important traits for team success is that team members must be accountable and hold each other accountable.  Accountability is indispensable to winning, whether on the ice or in business or as a citizen.

I also emphasize that to achieve optimally you have to invite competition and be honest in evaluating the competition – and yourself.

On June 25, I was in Waterbury, CT to help Saint Mary’s Hospital and the surrounding community celebrate the hospital’s receipt of a prestigious Get With The Guidelines (GWTG) Gold and Silver Award conferred by the American Heart Association and the American Stroke Association.   I spoke at the “We Got The Gold” event, met with patients and hospital staff and local residents, and talked with the media.

In preparing for my appearance at Saint Mary’s Hospital and in the time I spent at the hospital that day, I realized more and more that the GWTG program is an excellent example of how accountability and competition and evaluation are fundamental to superior performance and success.   I also learned that Saint Mary’s Hospital demonstrates what championship teamwork is all about.

As explained at the Get With The Guidelines website, GWTG is a hospital-based quality improvement program that “empowers healthcare provider teams [emphasis mine] to consistently treat heart and stroke patients according to the most up-to-date guidelines.”

Hospitals choose to participate in GWTG.   Those that invite the challenge are evaluated in how well they follow the most current guidelines for the treatment of coronary artery disease, heart failure, or stroke.  Hospitals earn a GWTG Gold Performance Award if for 24 consecutive months they provide “defect free” treatment to at least 85 percent of patients treated in accordance with a series of prescribed quality measures.  Hospitals earn a Silver Performance Award if they maintain this performance for 12 consecutive months.   A Bronze Performance Award is recognition for a hospital achieving this standard for 90 consecutive days.

Saint Mary’s is the first hospital in Connecticut to receive a GWTG Gold Award for treatment of coronary artery disease – and it is the first hospital in the state to receive a Silver Award for the treatment of patients with heart failure.

Actually, Saint Mary’s exceeded the GWTG standard, delivering defect free treatment to more than 95 percent of patients with coronary artery disease over a period of two years, and more than 92 percent of patients with heart failure over 12 consecutive months.

“We ‘got the gold’ through a team effort – through administrators, nurses, technicians, doctors, everyone, working so hard, caring so much, and working so cooperatively,” said Dr. Paul Kelly, cardiologist with Cardiology Associates of Waterbury, who pioneered the Get With The Guidelines program at Saint Mary’s.

 
“Saint Mary’s is definitely a leader in the state of Connecticut, as well as the country; the hospital delivers excellent care,” said Amanda McCulley, RD, MPH, Director of Quality Improvement Initiatives for the American Heart Association.

Improving cardiovascular health is personal for me:  my dad had a heart attack when only in his mid 40s, and when he was 68, he died suddenly from a burst abdominal aortic aneurysm, or triple-A.  We didn’t even know he had a triple-A; he had never been checked for one even though with a history of heart disease he would have been determined at risk.  A simple ultrasound could have detected the triple-A and it could have been repaired.

I am in my third year in working with Gore Medical as a spokesperson for its Ultimate SAAAVE (www.ultimatesaaave.com), a public affairs campaign that publicizes the importance those at risk for triple-A to be screened for the condition.  Risk factors for triple-A include a family history of vascular disease, a history of smoking, obesity, and high cholesterol.  Males, 60 or older, who have any of these factors in their background, are particularly at risk.

I have been screened for triple-A – a procedure that involves a simple and painless ultrasound – and I am thankful that no aneurysm appeared.

My brother, Don, 61, recently had quadruple bypass surgery, which was successful.  When he was only 20 years old, he had a brain aneurysm repaired.  Finally … finally … Don has quit smoking.      
I am forever gratified and thankful that I played with an exceptional group of young men that was coached by Herb Brooks, a mentor for the ages.  We surprised – even shocked many of the experts – with what we accomplished at the 1980 Winter Olympics.

What we did at Lake Placid was not a miracle.  It was the result of a lot of hard work and of constantly being accountable and holding one another accountable.  It was about inviting competition and subjecting ourselves, over and over, to evaluation and review.  It all paid off.  This is how greatness is achieved.

And this is how the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association and their Get With The Guidelines – and how Saint Mary’s Hospital and other hospitals across the United States in taking up the GWTG challenge – promote and build great cardiac care, and great teamwork.

Olympic gold medalist Jim Craig was the goaltender for the 1980 U.S. “Miracle on Ice” hockey team.  He is president of Gold Medal Strategies (www.goldmedalstrategies.com).