TAHLEQUAH — When she got a call requesting her presence at Monday night’s Tahlequah City Hospital Board meeting, Janey Griffin almost didn’t have time to take it.

She was in the middle of the Tulsa State Fairgrounds, ready to take a bite out of a corn dog.

The sprightly 93-year-old has come a long way since she entered the inpatient rehab unit at TCH on Aug. 29, 2005, scarcely able to move a muscle and unable to talk.

She told board members Monday night the rehab unit saved her life — and gave her a new quality of life. The board recognized her as one of the unit’s success stories.

“If it hadn’t been for this hospital, I would have died. Of course, the Lord wasn’t ready for me,” Griffin said.

She’s no stranger to TCH. She worked there for about 30 years, starting as a switchboard operator and receptionist when the hospital occupied its old location at the current city hall and courthouse building. She retired more than two decades ago.

Griffin had enjoyed an active life until June 2005. One Sunday during church, a friend asked her what was wrong and she didn’t know. By July, she was in a local nursing home in a catatonic state, unable to communicate. She could blink her eyes and that was about it. She didn’t know what had happened to her, and doesn’t remember that time today.

After being in the nursing home 20 days, her insurance was about to run out. Her family didn’t know what to do.

Her son, Clyde Southern Jr., visited her at the nursing home, and “there was nothing there.” She didn’t even know him. He became resigned to the fact he would have to bury his mother soon.

Then Sharon Cox, director of the newly-opened inpatient rehab unit at TCH, was visiting another nursing home patient. Despite Griffin’s poor condition and prognosis, she saw a spark there.

“She was one of those that just kind of tugged at me,” Cox said. “She was nonverbal, didn’t move at all, didn’t move her toe, didn’t move her finger. She was alert, aware of herself, but couldn’t move at all.”

She convinced a skeptical Dr. John Galdamez, TCH medical director, to give Griffin a chance in the rehab unit. Galdamez discovered

Griffin suffered a neurological disorder caused by her medication. Changing the medication, along with a regime of physical rehab, restored her to a quality life.

“She was one of our very first patients. To this day, she’s one of our star patients,” Cox said.

“She walked and talked out of here, and we had a little parade when she left.”

Soon after entering the unit, Griffin began to talk.

“Her first words were that she wanted her lipstick. Then we called and told her family to bring the shade she really wanted,” Cox said.

“I couldn’t move my arms, I couldn’t feed myself,” Griffin recalled of her early rehab days.

After her discharge, she attended outpatient rehab sessions to complete her recovery. Since then, she’s been to Ohio and is active in the community. She lives with her daughter, Linda Jones, who said sometimes she has to hurry to keep up with Griffin.

Board members gave her a round of applause, then considered the regular business for the month.

Dr. Berry Winn, vice president of medical staff, said that during July, the emergency room saw 1,949 patients. The average of patient stay was 130 minutes, and those who were admitted had to wait less than two hours for admission. The overall satisfaction rate was 90 percent.

Winn said that was higher than the ads he has seen from many institutions, bragging that they had an 85 percent satisfaction rate from ER patients.

Hospitalists (physicians who treat hospitalized patients) made 556 patient contacts during July, seeing an average of 12.9 patients per shift. The patients’ length of stay was decreased by more than four days.

TCH has been campaigning for staff members to wash their hands frequently, and the compliance rate most recently reported was 97 percent. Winn said that’s the highest he’s seen in any institution he’s reviewed.

CEO Brian Woodliff said the American Osteopathic Association has reviewed the hospital’s new internal medicine training program and has authorized nine positions, effective in July 2012.

TCH has applied for grant funding for these positions and expects to hear the results of that application by the end of the year.

He said TCH continues to recruit physicians and is expecting to sign on doctors in internal medicine and several other specializations.

What’s next

The next meeting of the Tahlequah City Hospital Board of Trustees will be held at 5:30 p.m., Monday, Nov. 14, in the TCH West conference room