Valley Baptist Medical Center-Brownsville has received the American College of Cardiology’s NCDR Chest Pain-MI Registry Platinum Performance Achievement Award for 2025, one of only 323 hospitals nationwide to receive the honor.
The award recognizes Valley Baptist-Brownsville’s commitment and success in implementing a higher standard of care for heart attack patients. It signifies that Valley Baptist-Brownsville has achieved the aggressive goal of treating patients to the highest standard levels of care as outlined by the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association clinical guidelines and recommendations.
To receive the Chest Pain-MI Registry Platinum Performance Achievement Award, Valley Baptist-Brownsville has demonstrated sustained achievement in the Chest Pain-MI Registry for two consecutive years (2023 and 2024). The hospital performed at the highest level for specific performance measures. Full participation in the registry engages hospitals in a robust quality improvement process using data to drive improvements in adherence to guideline recommendations and overall quality of care provided to heart attack patients.
“It is an honor to award Valley Baptist-Brownsville with the Platinum Performance Award for their valuable national leadership and dedication to meeting comprehensive performance measures in patient care,” said Michael C. Kontos, MD, FACC, chair of the NCDR Chest Pain – MI Registry Steering Subcommittee, and cardiologist at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center. “The receipt of this award indicates that Valley Baptist-Brownsville remains committed to providing top-quality, guideline-driven care for heart attack patients. Their success ensures patients are receiving the highest quality cardiovascular care.”
The Centers for Disease Control estimates that over 800,000 Americans suffer a heart attack each year. A heart attack occurs when a blood clot in a coronary artery partially or completely blocks blood flow to the heart muscle. Treatment guidelines include administering aspirin upon arrival and discharge, timely restoration of blood flow to the blocked artery, smoking cessation counseling, and cardiac rehabilitation, among others.
Dr. Fadi Alfayoumi, an interventional cardiologist with Valley Baptist Physician Network and Medical Director of Valley Baptist-Brownsville’s Cardiac Care Services, said the achievement award is tangible proof that Valley Baptist-Brownsville is on the cutting edge of caring for cardiac patients throughout the Rio Grande Valley.
“We are incredibly proud of the nationwide recognition we’ve earned at Valley Baptist-Brownsville, and it inspires us to work even harder for our cardiac patients. Our entire team is heavily invested in making sure we provide our community with the highest standard of cardiac care,” he said. “We’ve built a very powerful, highly motivated, caring team for our patients, and it is my personal belief that we’ve built the strongest cardiac care team in the entire Rio Grande Valley.”
Chest Pain-MI Registry empowers health care provider teams to consistently treat heart attack patients according to the most current, science-based guidelines and establishes a national standard for understanding and improving the quality, safety, and outcomes of care provided for patients with coronary artery disease, specifically high-risk heart attack patients.
