Turbacz is the highest of many gentle peaks that dominate the Gorce Mountains in southernmost Poland. It offers beautiful views of the snowcapped Tatra and Pieniny Mountains, especially from the scenic clearings along the green trail leading up from the city of Nowy Targ.
Angels consultant Katarzyna Putyło (Kasia) had always wanted to hike up these mountains and after Nowotarski was identified as a potential Angels Region, she looked forward to visiting her favourite part of Poland.
But throughout 2024, bad weather conditions kept her grounded, and in the end Nowotarski would be confirmed as an Angels Region before she made it to the top of Turbacz.
When the regional strategy was launched at ESOC 2024, this region’s two primary centres – Sucha Beskidzka Hospital and Nowy Targ Hospital – already had nearly 40 diamond awards between them. It was the legacy of former Angels consultant Mateusz Stolarczyk, who had steered both hospitals to their first Angels Award in 2018.
Nowotarski was a strong candidate for Angels Region status. Two hospitals with stroke units provided adequate coverage to stroke patients in the region, and the public awareness goal was also within sight. Thanks to the support of Dr Paweł Wrona in neighbouring Krakow, Nowotarski was about to become one of the first regions in Poland to meet their target for FAST Heroes implementation.
The complete absence of data gathering by all three of the regions’s EMS services was the last remaining challenge, or so it appeared.
People power
The Nowotarski success story was a story about bright spots and amazing people, Kasia said in the weeks following the regional celebration. On the guest list for the ceremony had been two bright spots who, though they were no longer active in the region, continued to spread their light. Mateusz Stolarczyk, now the globetrotting leader of Angels teams in South Africa, Indonesia and Ukraine, made it back to Poland for the event. And Kasia reserved a front row seat for retired Dr Jerzy Binek, a staunch advocate for RES-Q who had infected his small provincial hospital with enthusiasm for quality monitoring.
It was Dr Binek’s retirement from Sucha Beskidzka Hospital at the start of 2024 that set in motion the sequence of events that would end Sucha Beskidzka’s unbroken run of 22 diamond awards. He had passed the mantel to fellow data enthusiast Dr Patrycja Derbisz, and the hospital went on to reel in two more diamond awards. But after Dr Derbisz left to pursue specialization and motherhood, the demands of data entry couldn’t be met consistently.
This meant that, as well as turning Sucha Beskidzka EMS into a contender for an EMS Angels Award, Kasia had to get the hospital back on track. Fortunately, a new generation of bright spots was ready to shine.
The first of these appeared in the shape of emergency department coordinator Nurse Katarzyna Kuśnierz, who embraced the task of uploading the EMS data to RES-Q. It soon emerged that some prehospital data was falling through the cracks.
“Prenotification wasn’t being captured,” Kasia says. “So the paramedics were calling ahead but not recording it.” It was a problem easily solved with an improved prehospital checklist, and in Q4 of 2024, following a training program that included ASLS, the ambulance team at Sucha Beskidzka earned their first and potentially their last gold award. They reach diamond status in Q1 of 2025.
At Nowy Targ Hospital Kasia had found, in its head neurologist, Dr Iwona Sinkiewicz, “a stroke champion with Angels spirit”. The hospital already had an almost flawless pathway that implemented all the key priority actions recommended by Angels, and Dr Sinkiewicz was enthusiastic about the Angels Region strategy and determined to be first. Plus she had just the right medicine for an EMS coordinator who wasn’t that keen on quality monitoring.
At a training event for two EMS services (from Nowy Targ and Zakopane), Dr Sinkiewicz shared her hospital’s data from when they first started treating stroke with thrombolysis. After being shown the dramatic reduction in door-to-needle time from 66 minutes to an average of 30 minutes, the EMS coordinator was on board. And with paramedic Ewa Kondera putting up her hand to capture the data in RES-Q, Nowy Targ EMS was soon on track for platinum status.
Over at Zakopane EMS, Kasia had made the acquaintance of not one but two more data collection enthusiasts, paramedics Paweł Mickowski and Justyna Długopolska. Committed though they were to data-driven improvement, by mid January these two bright spots were at risk of missing out on their Q4 platinum award when the deadline caught them off guard. But help was on the way.
Time flies
When newcomers to quality monitoring upload their data for the first time, she always schedules an in-person meeting right before the quarterly deadline, Kasia says. This opportunity for eleventh-hour troubleshooting was the reason why January 2025 saw her traveling once again to her favourite part of Poland which was now in the grip of an icy winter.
At Zakopane EMS station, a last-minute technical setback had ruled out data entry via the usual channels. Fortunately, this was a team accustomed to thinking on their feet in a crisis, and familiar with the two-way radio as a communication lifeline in an emergency. Capturing quality monitoring data with the help of a walkie talkie was a first, Kasia admits. And it was not yet the end of her deadline adventures.
The team in Nowy Targ, where data protection issues had caused delays, was also at risk of missing the deadline and the stakes were rising by the hour. By now Kasia knew that one more EMS Award was all it would take for Nowotarski to become an Angels Region, and Ewa Kondera was determined that Nowy Targ should not be the reason that goal wasn’t met.
Knuckling down, Kasia and Ewa wrapped up the task at 10.30 pm – 90 minutes shy of the deadline and much too late to drive home. Besides, the weather had taken a turn for the worse, and high winds and heavy rain made travel hazardous.
An “extreme but amazing experience” ended in a sleepover that sealed the bond of friendship between Kasia and Ewa.
By March 2025, Nowotarski was easing into early spring, with temperatures occasionally rising to 17 degrees. Kasia was back in Nowy Targ to plan the celebration, and it was finally time to climb the mountain.
“It was an emotional celebration for me,” she says of finally reaching the highest peak. “I highly recommend it, because the views from up there are amazing.”
