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This informative newsletter is a 12-page monthly resource that provides you with the hands-on advice, tools (including data collection forms), and best practices that you need to ensure your hospital scores high on its quality measures and receives all of the Medicare reimbursement it deserves!

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Quality Improvement Report

Issue 9, September 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• CMS issues new reporting rules on surgical improvement measures

  Most hospitals will soon start reporting on the new Surgical Care Improvement Project (SCIP...

• New Jersey uses Leapfrog program to boost quality and efficiency

  Seven years ago, the JenksHealthcare Business Report released its annual ranking of states' quality...

• New reporting rules put spotlight on QI departments

  A lot of quality improvement (QI) directors might be overwhelmed by the new reporting requirements...

• U.K. way ahead of U.S. on healthcare performance

  The United Kingdom's citizens are healthier than those in the United States, although it spends...

Issue 8, August 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• Patient-centered advocate recounts how hospital ignored her insights

  Last summer Alison S. Clay, MD, was stung by a bee, rushed to the hospital, and given 10 times the...

• Money talks when it comes to getting CEOs interested in quality

  Bruce Siegel, MD, MPH, has a few tips for quality improvement (QI) directors hoping to get their...

• Boards keyed-in to quality at top performing hospitals

  The top performing hospitals in the country have boards of directors that don't confine quality to...

• Hospital uses an error to teach staff about med rec

  McLeod Regional Medical Center in Florence, SC, began its journey toward improving medication...

Issue 7, July 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• CMS proposal would add 11 new reporting requirements

  As early as this fall, quality improvement directors could face 11 new reporting requirements from...

• This health system is ahead of the game on two new JCAHO goals

  When the Joint Commission came out with its two new National Patient Safety Goals (NPSG) last...

• Wake up the board with these quarterly reports

  For much of her 23-year healthcare career, hospital quality director Sallie Gatlin, CPHQ, sat...

• Small healthcare community is EHR pioneer

  The worst-case scenario for anyone who works in a hospital goes like this: A patient arrives in the...

• Good data and strong leadership lead to P4P success

  Strong leadership and clean, consistent data led to high-quality care and a financial bonus for...

Issue 6, June 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• Two pay-for-performance plans see dramatic gains in improvement

  Editor's note: This is the first in an occasional series on how two of the nation's biggest...

• Number of bed sores rises as JCAHO considers them as possible goal

  A new study has found that the number of patients with bed sores rose 63% from 1993 to...

• Staff query patients on race and ethnicity in seconds

  Thirty-seven seconds. That's how much additional time it took for workers at Northwestern...

• How one hospital got physician buy-in on med rec

  Melanie Miles-Kent, director of quality improvement at Flagler Hospital in St. Augustine, FL, has...

Issue 5, May 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• Hospitalists boost level of quality improvement in acute-care settings

  During the past 10 years, the number of physicians who specialize as hospitalists has grown from a...

• At FL hospital, formal process orients docs to quality improvement

  At Flagler Hospital in St. Augustine, FL, a 327-bed community hospital just south of Jacksonville...

• GAO: CMS not adequately ensuring data completeness

  CMS must install more rigorous procedures to ensure the completeness of data submitted by hospitals...

• AHRQ tool may serve as linchpin for state efforts

  States generally act independently in their efforts to drive quality improvement in healthcare...

Issue 4, April 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• Nuclear industry improvement protocols find place in hospital settings

  Issues regarding safety apply to both sectors Howard Bergendahl has spent more than 20 years...

• Cox Health finds success with noninvasive pressure ventilation

  Protocol plays key role in rapid response team Using noninvasive positive pressure ventilation...

• Wayne Memorial develops matrix to prioritize performance improvement initiatives

  Last year at Wayne Memorial Hospital in Goldsboro, NC, quality improvement leaders were sitting in...

• Institute of Medicine recommends renewed focus for quality improvement

  QIOs disagree with eliminating role in handling complaints The second of three planned reports...

Issue 3, March 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• Pay for performance is on the way, but efforts still lack a national focus

  More than 700 attendees gathered for the first annual National Pay for Performance Summit in Los...

• Leapfrog Group program moves into financial reimbursement phase

  The Leapfrog Group Hospital Rewards Program has pioneered the move toward pay for performance for...

• The JCAHO weighs in on pay for performance

  Pay for performance operates in a complex reimbursement environment that often creates barriers to...

Issue 2, February 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• IOM calls for national performance measurement system

  The Institute of Medicine (IOM) of the National Academies of Science made an urgent call for a...

• HCAHPS survey coming in 2006; link to future reimbursement expected

  CMS is poised to start the implementation process of the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Health...

• AHRQ developing regulations for patient safety law

  The Patient Safety Law and Quality Improvement Act was enacted by Congress in summer 2005 amid much...

• AHRQ developing regulations for patient safety law

  The Patient Safety Law and Quality Improvement Act was enacted by Congress in summer 2005 amid much...

Issue 1, January 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• More work needed to reach 100K Lives campaign goals

  By all accounts, the Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s (IHI) 100,000 Lives campaign has...

• Strategies for implementing campaign

  IHI Vice President Carol Haraden, PhD, spoke to attendees about practical strategies for...

• Multistate health system targets zero preventable error rate

  As the largest nonprofit health system in the country, St. Louis-based Ascension Health System...

• Implementing CRM at a large academic hospital

  The aviation industry started to adopt crew resource management (CRM) as an error-reduction tool in...

Issue 12, December 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• Listening, medication info critical to patient satisfaction

  Hospitals that want to score well on patient satisfaction surveys should pay special attention to...

• Communication root cause of medical errors

  What we have here is a failure to communicate. "Nurses and, I think, doctors are reluctant to...

• Experts weigh in on transparency and quality

  Editor's note: HealthLeaders, a sister publication of this newsletter, published by HCPro, recently...

• How to coexist with clinicians you can't stand

  Wild with anger, the surgeon confronts you in front of a handful of colleagues, challenging your...

Issue 11, November 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• ED dashboard helps improve patient flow

  Emergency departments (ED) are seeing more people than ever before, treating sicker patients than...

• What do patients want in the discharge process?

  This is the first in a series of regular columns by Press Ganey by Paul Alexander Clark, MPA, MA...

• Leadership key to creating culture of safety

  When the National Aeronautics and Space Agency (NASA) called in Thomas Krause, PhD, to examine and...

• Measures that affect ER efficiency surprise hospital

  Asking emergency room (ER) doctors to smile, shake patients' hands, and sit down when talking to...

• Leapfrog to IOM: P4P needs to happen more rapidly

  Two of the nation's biggest pay-for-performance (P4P) proponents are praising the Institute for...

Issue 10, October 1, 2006 - VIEW THE FULL ISSUE

• Patient satisfaction surveys lead to better performance

  Eight years ago, when Massachusetts unveiled how hospitals scored on patient satisfaction surveys...

• Start small before taking on big P4P projects

  Quality improvement (QI) directors hoping to win support for ambitious pay-for-performance (P4P...

• Hospitals start reporting on new SCIP measures

  Voluntary reporting begins this month on Surgical Care Improvement Project (SCIP) measures related...