On Monday, Oct. 2, HSHS St. John’s Hospital began implementing the American Heart Association’s Resuscitation Quality Improvement Program. The program brings mobile CPR training carts to the hospital, which will help staff maintain skill competency through frequent CPR training.

Instead of recertifying every two years, HSHS St. John’s Hospital staff will now be able to attend quarterly trainings using the mobile CPR carts, which are located throughout the hospital on various floors. The high-volume, low-frequency, training sessions will make it easier for staff to retain skills between sessions. The AHA program enables online testing of cognitive components and the CPR stations are equipped with both adult and infant mannequins as well as a laptop which links the student to training materials and real-time voice and visual feedback on compressions and ventilations, as well as additional reinforcements or suggestions for improvement.

RQI training will be made available to all HSHS St. John’s Hospital staff that has direct bedside contact with patients. The first round of training began Monday, Oct. 2, with hospital educators, assistant managers and house supervisors. According to Alexis Williams, director of education and professional practice at St. Johns, “They will learn how to use and navigate the RQI carts so they can support our frontline colleagues who will be using them for recertification. Anyone who has direct contacts with patients at the bedside is required to have certification BLS and for critical care areas, ACLS is required as well.”