Case Studies
Timely notification of critical laboratory values ensures prompt clinical intervention for potential life-threatening conditions and is a requirement of regulatory and accreditation agencies including The Joint Commission and the College of American Pathologists.
The Jacobi Medical Center Department of Radiology analyzed the 15.3 percent rise in annual computerized tomography (CT) requests from 2007 to 2009 to identify opportunities to prevent overutilization and resulting patient harm from radiation exposure. The interdepartmental nature and…
Health Quest uses and benefits from a system wide root cause analysis policy to address adverse and near-miss events. The expressed purpose is to learn from each other, share what is learned, and help prevent similar occurrences in all of the system's hospitals. This policy is a powerful…
Continuum Health Partners' pay-for performance program (P4P) is designed to partner with physicians to help the organization improve quality and safety, and reduce inpatient resource utilization by eliminating medically unnecessary services. Goals are to implement more efficient practice…
With unique culture trends and stringent regulatory obligations, patient care units are often challenged to remain viable: developing and growing new services is not generally a goal of inpatient units in countering this threat. Claxton-Hepburn Medical Center successfully matched a need--available…
Brooks Memorial Hospital's radiology department identified a need to improve the transcription of radiology test orders by patient care unit staff into the computerized hospital information system. The primary objective is to assure patient safety by promoting accuracy, accountability, and…
Failure or delays in filling prescriptions at the time of hospital discharge contributes to poor outcomes and readmissions to the hospital within 30 days. In addition, errors in discharge prescriptions are common and difficult to resolve or identify at a remote community pharmacy, and may…
Stern Family Center for Extended Care and Rehabilitation tracked hospital readmissions and found that more than 25 percent of the readmissions were for heart failure. These findings were presented and discussed at its monthly Performance Improvement Coordinating Group meeting. A task force was…
The goal of this performance improvement initiative was to improve patient safety and control health care system costs by improving the patient's post-discharge medication management.
Ellis Medicine started this project in April 2010 to reduce readmissions, as readmissions are clinically undesirable, changes in reimbursement methodologies are making them financially undesirable, and low readmission rates may serve as a measure of quality. After reviewing successful programs in…