Cooper’s Critical Care Team Receives Two National Honors for Efforts During Pandemic

Members of Cooper’s Critical Care team

Cooper University Health Care’s Critical Care team will receive two national awards from the Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM) for their outstanding efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic. The two awards – The Family-Centered Care Innovation Award and the 2022 ICU Heroes Award – will be presented at the 51st SCCM Critical Care Congress in February.

“Our critical care team has performed with courage and distinction throughout the pandemic and these two prestigious awards are well deserved recognition of their expertise and commitment to serving patients throughout the region,” said Kevin O’Dowd, JD, co-CEO of Cooper.

“As one of three health systems appointed by the Governor to manage the state’s COVID-19 response, Cooper’s critical care team provided outstanding guidance, leadership, and tireless dedication to their patients. Their efforts undoubtedly saved hundreds of lives,” said Anthony J. Mazzarelli, MD, JD, MBE, co-CEO of Cooper.

“I am incredibly proud of my team for the outstanding dedication, skill, and compassion they give to their patients every single day,” said Nitin Puri, MD, chief of critical care medicine at Cooper.

The critical care team will receive The Family-Center Care Innovation Award – presented to a program that demonstrates novel, effective methods of providing care to critically ill and injured patients and their families – for the CritiCall Connections program. Through CritiCall Connections, senior medical students from Cooper Medical School of Rowan University (CMSRU) served as liaisons between the critical care staff and patients’ families. The volunteer medical students provided families with key information and updates on their hospitalized loved one while enabling the critical care physicians to spend more time on direct patient care. The program also gave the medical students invaluable experience and the ability to help during surges in the pandemic.

The 2022 ICU Heroes Award recognizes that patients and families are an integral part of intensive care unit (ICU) care. The award is given to an ICU patient and family and to the multi-professional team that delivered the care.

Former COVID-19 patient Jonathan Rosen will receive the award along with members of Cooper’s Critical Care team. Rosen was one of the first critically ill COVID-19 patients successfully treated with ECMO (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation), a highly specialized life-support therapy that saved the lives of many COVID-19 patients who otherwise may have died. Rosen and his family formed close ties with Cooper’s Critical Care team during and after his long bout and recovery from COVID-19. Rosen is now in training to run a marathon along with Adam Green, MD, one of Cooper’s critical care doctors who cared for him.

The CritiCalls program enlisted the help of senior medical students from Cooper Medical School of Rowan University to communicate with patients’ families during the height of the pandemic.

Members of Cooper’s Critical Care team were featured in Stories in Care, a riveting video series highlighting the COVID-19 experiences of its frontline workers. Told in emotional, first-person accounts, Stories in Care captures the triumphs, tragedies, and recollections of health care workers through one of the nation’s most pressing public health crises in decades. Stories in Care won a coveted Gold Award in the 42nd Annual Telly Awards, which recognizes the best work created in video and television across all screens, and is a finalist for the best video series in the 2022 PR Daily Content Marketing Awards.

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