For Critical Access Hospitals or Free-Standing EDs
Critical access hospitals (CAHs) and free-standing Emergency Departments (FSEDs) face three critical challenges in chest pain care:
- Limited access to onsite cardiac expertise
- Delays and complexity associated with patient transfers
- The need to confidently risk-stratify patients while avoiding unnecessary admissions or transfers.
Chest Pain Center Certifications help address these challenges by providing standardized protocols, evidence-based clinical pathways, and a structured framework for transfer coordination and quality improvement, enabling CAHs and FSEDs to deliver timely, consistent and high-quality chest pain care.
Strengthen your organization's reputation as a leader in cardiovascular excellence while improving outcomes for patients when they need it most. The ACC celebrates and promotes your achievements annually, helping elevate your visibility and leadership within the cardiovascular community.
Why Certification Matters: Better Patient Flow. Better Outcomes.
For facilities where every bed, transfer and clinical decision matters, Chest Pain Center Certification provides a framework of eight essential components for delivering consistent, evidence-based chest pain care while supporting efficient resource utilization and patient-centered outcomes.
By reducing clinical variation and improving consistency, certification helps your team:
- Reduce variations of evaluation and treatment
- Improve identification of high-risk patients
- Support timely transfer and escalation decisions
- Reduce Door-to-Door-to-Reperfusion times
- Improve consistency of Door-to-Needle times
- Decrease length of stay (LOS)
- Avoid unnecessary admissions
- Decrease return visits and readmissions
- Strengthen coordination with EMS and receiving hospitals
Every facility is paired with an Accreditation Review Specialist (ARS) who serves as a dedicated partner throughout your accreditation process. Your ARS provides personalized guidance, answers questions and helps teams navigate requirements with confidence.
Designed to Fit Your Data Strategy
Now CAHs and FSEDs can take advantage of the same up-to-date, evidence-based resources that over 1,000 hospitals use and trust every day via the Chest Pain MI Registry®. Participation in the registry is required.
Resources to Support Your Success
Access tools and education designed to strengthen your program and accelerate results:
Start Improving Chest Pain Care Today
Chest Pain Center Certification helps your organization deliver faster, more consistent and higher-quality care, while demonstrating your commitment to excellence.
Take the next step toward improving outcomes for your patients.
