Region

Blood drives in Greater Nashua

New Hampshire has reached a critical need for blood for local hospitals. Please consider donating as soon as possible to one of the following blood drives. For more information or to reserve a time, call 1-800-733-2767 or visit redcrossblood.org.

– 8:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. April 17: St. John Neumann Church, 708 Milford Road, Merrimack.

New toolkit for addicted moms

As the national opioid crisis worsens, eight community health practices and regional hospitals in northern New England have teamed up to produce an online toolkit to help maternal child health providers keep women with histories of substance use and their babies healthy. This resource is the result of collaborative work funded by a three-year grant that March of Dimes awarded in 2016 to the Northern New England Perinatal Quality Improvement Network (NNEPQIN) and Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

The project team concluded its second year in January, after pilot testing the toolkit in six health care facilities in New Hampshire and one each in Vermont and Maine. The resulting 15-chapter toolkit helps maternity care practices provide coordinated and compassionate care, and is now available on the NNEPQIN website.

The toolkit also will be used by Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s Center for Addiction Recovery in Pregnancy and Parenting (CARPP), a program that recently was awarded a $2.7 million grant from New Hampshire’s Department of Health and Human Services to help seven maternity care practices around the state implement effective screening and treatment for pregnant women with opioid use disorders. This funding is part of a $3.1 million federal grant that New Hampshire received as part of the 21st Century Cures Act, which is provided through the State Targeted Response to the Opioid Crisis Grants program.

The goal of the online toolkit is to help practitioners provide evidence-based care for women with substance use disorders that is consistent with national guidelines.

Area hospitals honored

GraniteOne Health is pleased to announce that members Catholic Medical Center (CMC) Physician Practice Associates in Manchester and Monadnock Community Hospital (MCH) physicians in Peterborough have been named to Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Physician Group Honor Roll. CMC and MCH are the only New Hampshire organizations on the 16th annual list.

The honor roll reflects exceptional performance in areas of adult and pediatric acute, chronic and preventative care. Harvard Pilgrim identifies these physician groups by measuring 15 different metrics against national standards from the Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set. Examples include, appropriate treatment for children with upper respiratory infection, including comprehensive diabetes care and breast cancer screening. Physician groups that score in the top percentile are named to the honor roll.

“Primary care is one of the most important and lasting services a health care organization can deliver,” said Dr. Keith Stahl, executive medical director for CMC Primary Care and GraniteOne Health Trustee. “When forming GraniteOne, it was clear that Monadnock shares CMC’s commitment to the highest-quality primary care experience. The HPHC Physician Group Honor Roll affirms that we are delivering on that commitment.”

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