The award recognizes significant contributions made by an environmental services department to the overall patient experience, including maintaining high levels of performance in cleaning, disinfecting, preventing infection and other categories.
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital Department of Environmental Services has received for the first time the 2022 Environmental Services Department of the Year Award from the Association for the Health Care Environment of the American Hospital Association.
The award recognizes significant contributions made by an environmental services department to the overall patient experience; achieving a health care organization’s mission; and maintaining high levels of performance in cleaning, disinfecting, preventing infection and other categories.
The St. Jude Department of Environmental Services also received a 2022 Certificate of Merit for the under 249-bed medical facility division.
Curt Vargo, director of the Department of Environmental Services at St. Jude, said the recognition highlights the team’s dedication to provide a clean, safe environment for St. Jude patients, who have vulnerable immune systems making them susceptible to infection, particularly to COVID-19.
“A major piece of it was the teamwork and the need to come together to make sure everyone was safe because of COVID. We not only met standards, but we also found ways to improve on some things we were doing before,” Vargo said. “This is a big ‘thank you’ for the dedication of our staff.”
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital is leading the way the world understands, treats and cures childhood cancer, sickle cell disease, and other life-threatening disorders. It is the only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center devoted solely to children. Treatments developed at St. Jude have helped push the overall childhood cancer survival rate from 20% to 80% since the hospital opened more than 60 years ago. St. Jude shares the breakthroughs it makes to help doctors and researchers at local hospitals and cancer centers around the world improve the quality of treatment and care for even more children. To learn more, visit stjude.org, read St. Jude Progress, a digital magazine, and follow St. Jude on social media at @stjuderesearch.