TriStar Heart Network

Who We Are...

The TriStar Heart Network is the largest, most comprehensive system of cardiovascular services in the Tennessee and South Central Kentucky region with more than 100 cardiologists and cardiothoracic surgeons who serve an estimated 160,000 patients each year.

Where We Are...

The TriStar Heart Network is unique in our community in that heart services are not centered in a single downtown Nashville location. We recognize that patients want to be able to access healthcare services in locations that convenient to where you live and work.

What We Do...

While the TriStar Heart Network does offer services at Centennial Medical Center for more complex procedures and treatments— like sophisticated Robotic and Beating Open Heart Surgery— that is complimented by a ring of community-based heart centers— all chest pain accredited—that offer sophisticated diagnostic technologies as well as community-based angioplasty, stenting and other minimally invasive procedures.

TriStar hospitals were the first in the state and among the first in the nation to achieve Chest Pain Accreditation. The TriStar Heart Network is the region’s largest Accredited Chest Pain Network and includes eight hospitals in Middle Tennessee and South Central Kentucky that have been working together as a network for more than a decade.

• Centennial Medical Center was also first to offer minimally invasive and beating heart surgery. For more information about Robotics and beating heart surgery, click here
• The TriStar Heart Network continually invests in the most sophisticated diagnostic and treatment advances.
• The TriStar Heart Network invests $3 million for the addition of a Dual Source CT Scanner— only one of its kind—at Centennial Medical Center.

What is Chest Pain Accreditation?

When you or someone you love is having a heart attack, minutes and miles matter. With 10 Accredited Chest Pain Centers in Tennessee and south central Kentucky close to where you live and work, a TriStar Health System facility can make the difference.

According to Dr. Gary Singer, emergency medicine physician for TriStar Health System, cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in the United States, accounting for 40 percent of all deaths. With cardiovascular disease on the rise, the Society of Chest Pain Centers (SCPC) partnered with the American College of Cardiology to establish best practices through protocols designed to address the diagnosis and treatment of acute coronary syndrome. These practices also promote process improvement to healthcare providers. The goal of the SCPC is to significantly reduce the mortality rate of heart attack patients by reducing the time it takes to receive treatment and increasing the accuracy and effectiveness of treatment.

By following these practices, hospitals receive designation as Chest Pain Centers and ultimately provide the highest level of care for patients experiencing heart attacks. The designation incorporates an on-site survey, as well as a self-survey of the hospital facilities. The two-year designation must be re-surveyed semi-annually for a hospital to maintain its status as a Chest Pain Center.

Specifically, as defined by the SCPC, a Chest Pain Center is:

• A process that starts from the time a patient activates Emergency Medical Services
  (EMS) to the time the patient is discharged from the hospital.
• A strategy to significantly reduce heart attack deaths through rapid treatment. If a patient with a heart attack is treated within 90 minutes, damage to the heart can be minimized.
• An effort to educate the community about the risks of heart disease and the importance of seeking help immediately upon feeling symptoms of a possible heart attack.
• A systematic approach to patient care that promotes the best possible use of current standards of care.