COVINGTON – The Adult Critical Care Unit at St. Tammany Health System’s flagship St. Tammany Parish Hospital have been recognized with a gold-level Beacon Award for Excellence from the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses for 2025, a recognition of its demonstrated dedication to delivery of high-quality critical care.
St. Tammany is one of only three Louisiana institutions to receive the recognition and the only one on the Northshore.
The Beacon Award recognizes hospital units that demonstrate sustained, high-level performance across key measures, including patient outcomes, nursing practice, quality improvement and workplace culture. Units earning a gold designation must show a consistent commitment to evidence-based care, patient safety, interdisciplinary collaboration and staff engagement. The award also underscores the importance of environments that support professional growth, teamwork and retention – all essential to delivering high-quality critical care.
“The Beacon Award is a highly respected recognition, and earning it speaks to the exceptional commitment of the nurses and care teams in our Adult Critical Care Unit,” STHS Assistant Vice President - Critical Care Teresa Krutzfeldt said. “This honor reflects the compassion, clinical excellence and teamwork our colleagues bring to patients and families every day. I am incredibly proud of the dedication and professionalism that made this achievement possible.”
The Beacon Award for Excellence recognizes unit caregivers who successfully improve unit outcomes and align practices with AACN’s six Healthy Work Environment Standards. Units that earn this annual award with a gold, silver or bronze designation meet specific criteria established by AACN representing the characteristics and components of the unit environment that nurses can influence to achieve nursing excellence.
As part of the rigorous application process, St. Tammany Health System’s Critical Care nurses identified and addressed multiple areas for enhancing the care they provide. That included:
- An initiative to reduce the rate of hospital-acquired pressure injuries, a key indicator of patient safety and quality of care. The STHS effort resulted in a 77% decrease in such injuries year-over-year.
- Implementation of a suite of security enhancements as a means of mitigating the local impacts of the ongoing national trend of violence in the hospital setting. Initial outcomes suggest these measures have led to increased staff satisfaction and fewer concerns about visitor-related threats during shifts, thus bolstering the contention that safety is not separate from quality but, rather, is foundational to it.
- Fostering a culture of support to encourage nurses to earn critical care certification.
AACN President Rebekah Marsh, BSN, RN, CCRN, praised St. Tammany and all of this year’s other Beacon winners for their dedication to optimizing patient care, adding that others can learn from their examples.
“The Beacon Award for Excellence recognizes caregivers in outstanding units whose consistent and systematic approach to evidence-based care optimizes patient outcomes,” Marsh said. “Units that receive this national recognition serve as role models to others on their journey to excellent patient and family care.”
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About St. Tammany Health System
The heartbeat of its community, St. Tammany Health System cares for patients and families with excellence, compassion and teamwork. It is nationally recognized for quality, safety and service excellence by CareChex, Leapfrog, Healthgrades, Hospital Compare, Women’s Choice and US News & World Report. The health system is home to 281-bed St. Tammany Parish Hospital Service District No. 1, three diagnostic centers and 12 medical clinics throughout western St. Tammany Parish. Self-supporting, not-for-profit STHS is AA- rated by Fitch and receives no tax funding. More at StTammany.health.
About the Beacon Award for Excellence
Established in 2003, the Beacon Award for Excellence offers a road map to help guide exceptional care through improved outcomes and greater overall patient satisfaction. U.S. and Canadian units where patients receive their principal nursing care after hospital admission qualify for this excellence award. Units that receive the Beacon Award for Excellence meet criteria in six categories: leadership structures and systems; appropriate staffing and staff engagement; effective communication, knowledge management, and learning and development; evidence-based practice and processes; and outcome measurement. To learn more, visit www.aacn.org/beacon or call 800-899-2226.
About the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses
For more than 50 years, the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN) has been dedicated to acute and critical care nursing excellence. The organization’s vision is to create a healthcare system driven by the needs of patients and their families in which acute and critical care nurses make their optimal contribution. AACN is the world’s largest specialty nursing organization, with about 130,000 members and over 200 chapters in the United States.