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Campbell County Memorial Hospital Receives ISO 9001:2008 Registration

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GILLETTE, WY – Campbell County Memorial Hospital has received ISO 9001:2008 registration from DNV Healthcare, Inc., its accrediting organization.

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) was founded in Geneva, Switzerland in 1947. Its purpose was to provide standardization of technical specifications for products traded in the international marketplace. The concept was first brought to the United States by the automobile industry in the late 1980s because of a need to qualify the thousands of suppliers used by automobile manufacturers. In 2001, a set of preliminary standards for healthcare was published by the American Society for Quality in partnership with the Automotive Industry Action Group. These standards were recently revised in 2008 to address the issues encountered by facilities in the service industries, including healthcare.

The basic idea of ISO 9001 is to find the things in a business that work best and turn them into standard operating procedures. They key to ISO 9001 is that it is perpetual, making each work activity as efficient as it can be, but also continually searching out improvements.

This process approach uses the following steps:
  • Document what you do
  • Establish a process for the service or activity
  • Perform to your documentation
  • Provide the service related to the process
  • Record the results of your work
  • Appropriately maintain all recorded information
  • Audit the documentation for effectiveness
  • Audit using a process approach
Accreditation standards require that hospitals become Compliant with ISO 9001 within three years of the first accreditation survey, but Registration for ISO 9001 is a voluntary option that hospitals may select. Registration involves significant additional effort apart from the regular accreditation requirements. There are 20 hospitals in the United States that have received ISO 9001: 2008 Registration through DNV Healthcare.

“We were not required to become ISO registered,” said Bob Morasko, CEO. “ISO is a practical philosophy that our local mining industry understands and appreciates. This registration shows our stakeholders that we are committed to the same quality and process improvement standards used by businesses throughout the world.”
  • Category: Health News