Quality & Patient Safety
Meritus Medical Center in Hagerstown, Md., has done something every hospital in America wants to do. “We decreased readmissions [from skilled nursing facilities] by 24 percent across the entire county,” says Andrea Horton, director of care management for the community hospital. “…
More than half of health executives expect to recoup their investments in population health management within four years, according to a survey report from KPMG. Other respondents weren’t quite as optimistic: 29 percent expect their investments in health information technology and data and…
Hospitals are making progress in reducing health care-associated infections, but additional work is still needed, according to a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Central line-associated bloodstream infections declined by 46 percent between 2008 and 2013. During the same…
While we were finishing up this issue of the magazine, Jonathan Perlin, M.D., the chair of the American Hospital Association’s board of trustees, and president of clinical services and chief medical officer of HCA, visited our Chicago office for the annual meet-the-chair event. It’s an…
Payers in population health contracts are using claims data to identify the physician responsible for a patient’s health and spending. It’s an inexact science that can aggravate providers before empowering them.
Snapshot By engaging patients with new services and technology, hospitals are heading off costly interventions and building loyalty. As Lisa Michaelis discusses various life coaching and wellness services offered by Mosaic Life Care, it might be easy to forget that she works for a hospital system.
This is 14 percent more than all hospitals with an organized quality improvement program that responded to the November 2014 American Hospital Association Survey of Care Systems and Payment. Hospitals use these programs to teach clinical leaders continuous quality improvement methods and team…
Snapshot Infrastructure costs, lack of on-site expertise and a fierce desire to remain independent have limited rural hospitals’ ability to respond to the quality and value imperatives of reform. But innovative regional alliances and ACO models are removing these barriers while strengthening…
After years of preparation, nine rural hospitals and physician groups form an accountable care organization to focus on prevention.
High-quality, patient-centered care has always been imperative for health care providers and their boards. But as reimbursement hinges more and more on fee for quality rather than fee for service, quality care has also become a financial imperative. Savvy boards recognize that delivering quality…