ANGIE LEVINE/Daily Bruin The Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care has accredited Ashe.
By Jeyling Chou
Daily Bruin Contributor
jchou@media.ucla.edu
A banner recently added to the facade of the Arthur Ashe Student Health & Wellness Center displays its first accreditation ever.
The center, which scored in the 98th percentile by the Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care, Inc., never received an accreditation before because of delays caused by the center’s 1995 relocation from its previous position near the UCLA Medical Center.
Applications for accreditation were deferred until things had settled down at the new facility, said Shannon Wong, administrative analyst to the director of the Ashe Center.
With the completion of the application process this year, the Ashe Center has been awarded three years of accreditation – the longest possible period granted by AAAHC.
“What the accreditation has done is validated what a good job we’re doing,” Wong said.
This recognition comes under the shadow of numerous complaints in January regarding a lack of prompt medical treatment and inefficiency of the Student Health Insurance Policy.
Mark Miranda, an electrical engineering graduate student, had a submission published in the Daily Bruin, where he criticized SHIP’s “care system that creates multiple layers of administrative work between patients and treatment” (“Ashe Center, SHIP are painfully incompetent,” Viewpoint, Jan. 24).
This unnecessary bureaucracy has “caused serious and unacceptable delays in attaining medical treatment,” he wrote.
The honor received is a recognition of excellent health care, said Shelley Pearson, director of ancillary services for the Ashe Center.
According to its Web site, the AAAHC develops and determines standards for health care facilities and evaluates institutions based on “essential to high quality patient care,” such as clinical records and the rights of the patient.
Through voluntary application, more than 1,400 organizations are accredited by the AAAHC.
Of the nine UC health centers, seven are accredited, including UCLA.
“We wanted to really know how we were doing and have outside professionals look at us,” Wong said.
Evaluation and assessment of the Ashe Center, Pearson said, is a constant priority and the main motivation for accreditation.
“That’s what we really wanted – objective feedback on what we might do and areas we can improve,” she said.
Areas to be worked on, which were highlighted by the evaluation, include the legibility of patient medical charts and increased frequency in background checks on employees, Pearson said.
Close records are kept of comments and suggestions from patients, Wong said. These records were made accessible to and considered by the accreditors, she continued.
Criteria for accreditation seemed to focus more on the clinical aspects and delivery of health care, she said.
The multi-step evaluation process included a self-assessment and documentation of services the center provides.
In March of this year, two outside health care providers representing the AAAHC conducted an on-site survey. The survey included comprehensive assessments of various facilities and services, such as pharmaceutical and laboratory services, health education and wellness.
Over a two-day period, they reviewed patient charts, interviewed doctors and patients, and looked over every aspect of the organization, Wong said.
“As part of the process, they do look at patient satisfaction with services,” she said.
The accreditors evaluated the Ashe Center on 400 standards determined by AAAHC for the provision of high quality health services, Pearson said.
Aside from an effort to confirm and better the institution itself, Pearson believes accreditation of a college health center also has a positive effect on the campus community.
“For the UCLA student, it means that they have a health service that they can be extremely proud of,” Pearson said. “For us, it validates the goals and objectives that we have been aiming for for a long time.”