Patients' own assessments of quality of primary care compared with objective records based measures of technical quality of care

Mala Rao, Aileen Clarke, Colin Sanderson, Richard Hammersley
BMJ 2006;333:19
[Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]

Alliance for Cardiac Care Excellence(ACE)

www.ofmq.com/ace.html

Twenty-nine leading healthcare organizations have joined forces to improve hospital care in the United States to ensure that all cardiac patients receive care consistent with nationally accepted standards.

The new coalition—the Alliance for Cardiac Care Excellence (ACE) — will help bridge the gap between clinical procedures and treatments proven to be most effective and the care many adult cardiac patients actually receive.

ACE Press Release

ACE Frequently Asked Questions

ACE Program Descriptions

The incidence and cost of adverse events in Victorian hospitals 2003–04

Jonathon P Ehsani, Terri Jackson and Stephen J Duckett
Med J Aust 2006; 184 (11): 551-555.

HTML PDF

AHRQ - Improving the Quality of Asthma Care

www.ahrq.gov/qual/asthmaqual.htm

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has developed Asthma Care Quality Improvement: A Resource Guide for State Action and its companion workbook, Asthma Care Quality Improvement: A Workbook for State Action. These materials were designed to help assess the quality of asthma care and create quality improvement strategies.

Asthma Care Quality Improvement: A Resource Guide for State Action (PDF File, 1.4 MB)

Asthma Care Quality Improvement: A Workbook for State Action (PDF File, 560 KB)

AHRQ Patient Safety and Health IT Conference

Conference Home and Agenda

The 2006 Patient Safety and Health IT Conference is an important meeting for anyone interested in new and emerging research around patient safety and health IT implementation; conference materials are now available.

Conference Themes and Topics

• Track 1: Patient Safety and Health IT Across Settings and Populations
• Track 2: Implementation Issues in Patient Safety and Health IT
• Track 3: Improving the Health of Communities through Regional Health Information Exchange (HIE)
• Track 4: Assessing Value and Evaluating Project Impact
• Track 5: Achieving and Sustaining Improvements
• Track 6: Using Reporting Systems for Safety and Quality Improvement
• Track 7: Working Conditions Challenges in Patient Safety
• Track 8: Patient and Family Centered Health IT and Safety
• Track 9: Emerging Approaches to Drive Change in Healthcare

Does date stamping ICD-9-CM codes increase the value of clinical information in administrative data?

Glance, L.G., Dick, A.W., Osler, T.M., and Mukamel, D.B.
Health Services Research 41(1), pp. 231-251.
html pdf

Expected and Unanticipated Consequences of the Quality and Information Technology Revolutions

Robert M. Wachter, MD
JAMA. 2006;295:2780-2783.

EXTRACT FULL TEXT PDF

Quality of Care for Patients Hospitalized for Acute Exacerbations of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Peter K. Lindenauer, Penelope Pekow, Shan Gao, Allison S. Crawford, Benjamin Gutierrez, and Evan M. Benjamin
Ann Intern Med 2006;144 894-903

Abstract Full Text PDF

National survey of surgical morbidity and mortality conferences.

Gore DC
Am J Surg. 2006 May;191(5):708-14.
PDF (222 K)

Understanding diagnostic errors in medicine: a lesson from aviation

H Singh, L A Petersen, and E J Thomas
Qual Saf Health Care 2006; 15: 159-164.
[Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]

Local clinical quality monitoring for detection of excess operative deaths.

Arrowsmith JE, Powell SJ, Nashef SA.
Anaesthesia. 2006 May;61(5):423-6.
html pdf

Linking community pharmacy dispensing data to prescribing data of general practitioners.

Florentinus SR, Souverein PC, Griens FA, Groenewegen PP, Leufkens HG, Heerdink ER.
BMC Med Inform Decis Mak. 2006 Apr 3;6:18.
pdf

Are there better ways to determine wait times?

Schaafsma, Joseph
CMAJ 2006 174: 1551-1552

[Full Text] [PDF]

Persistence of unsafe practice in everyday work

an exploration of organizational and psychological factors constraining safety in the operating room
S Espin, L Lingard, G R Baker, and G Regehr
Qual Saf Health Care 2006; 15: 165-170.
[Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]

The Care of Patients with Severe Chronic Illness: An Online Report on the Medicare Program

A new study by the Dartmouth Atlas Project at the Center for the Evaluative Clinical Sciences (CECS) at Dartmouth Medical School report that:

• The care of people with chronic illness accounts for more than 75% of all u.s. health care expenditures, but Medicare spends much more per enrollee in some states and regions than it does elsewhere.

• The differences in spending provide important insights into the causes of waste in the health care system – and the opportunities to improve both the quality and the efficiency of care.
  

Report: The Care of Patients with Severe Chronic Illness:An Online Report on the Medicare Program

Executive Summary

Interactive data tools and hospital performance reports by state

Printable copy of press release

What Do We Know about Health Care Team Effectiveness? A Review of the Literature

Louise Lemieux-Charles and Wendy L. McGuire
Med Care Res Rev 2006 63: 263-300.
[Abstract] [PDF]

Computer based medication error reporting: insights and implications

M R Miller, J S Clark, and C U Lehmann
Qual Saf Health Care 2006; 15: 208-213.
[Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]

Procedures in U.S. Hospitals, 2003: HCUP Fact Book No. 7

www.ahrq.gov/data/hcup/factbk7/

Merrill CT, Elixhauser A.
AHRQ Publication No. 06-0039, May 2006.
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, Rockville, MD.

The report highlights statistics for 2003 on:

• Number and types of procedures performed during a hospital stay.
• Age and gender variation in receipt of procedures.
• Sources of payment (i.e., who is billed) for various procedures.
• Procedures associated with the:
• Longest lengths of stay.
• Highest charges.
• Highest inpatient mortality.

In addition, information is presented on the share of the Nation's hospitals that were high-volume providers for specific procedures as well as on how various patient safety indicators changed between 1997 and 2003.

PDF File (9.7 KB)

The "To Err is Human" report and the patient safety literature

H T Stelfox, S Palmisani, C Scurlock, E J Orav, and D W Bates
Qual Saf Health Care 2006; 15: 174-178.
[Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]

CMWF - Mirror, Mirror on the Wall

An Update on the Quality of American Health Care Through the Patient's Lens
K. Davis, C. Schoen, S. C. Schoenbaum, A.-M. J. Audet, M. M. Doty, A. L. Holmgren, and J. L. Kriss.
The Commonwealth Fund, April 2006.

Overview

report (pdf)

Active surveillance using electronic triggers to detect adverse events in hospitalized patients

Szekendi, M K, Sullivan, C, Bobb, A, Feinglass, J, Rooney, D, Barnard, C, Noskin, G A
Qual Saf Health Care 2006 15: 184-190
[Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]


Editorial

Automated surveillance for adverse events in hospitalized patients: back to the future
Kilbridge, P M, Classen, D C
Qual Saf Health Care 2006 15: 148-149
[Extract] [Full text] [PDF]

AHRQ - Release of the Pediatric Quality Indicator Risk Adjustment Module

www.qualityindicators.ahrq.gov/pdi_download.htm

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) announce the release of the AHRQ Pediatric Quality Indicator (PedQI) risk adjustment module in SAS (Version 3.0b)

Physician reactions to quantitative individual performance reports

Beckman, H; Suchman, AL; Curtin, K; Greene, RA
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF MEDICAL QUALITY, 21 (3): 192-199; MAY-JUN 2006
[Abstract] [PDF]