The notion of linking a portion of Medicare payments to valid measures of quality, or paying for performance, is clearly here to stay. The concept has broad support from the Administration, Congress, CMS, and several specialty societies, even though many questions about its implementation must still be answered. The Public Policy Committee will work to position SHM to influence this important debate.
In the first phase of the Medicare Value Purchasing Act of 2005 implementation, Medicare reimbursement rates would be tied directly to reporting data on quality measures, while the second phase ties a portion of payment to provider performance.
SHM Partners with Patient Safety Leadership Fellowship Program
Focus on interdisciplinary leadership and patient safety proves invaluable
By Jeanne M. Huddleston, MD, FACP
SHM is now a partner in the Patient Safety Leadership Fellowship (PSLF) program, an intensive learning experience that develops leadership competencies and advances patient safety in healthcare through a dynamic, highly participatory, structured learning community.
The Health Forum-American Hospital Association and the National Patient Safety Foundation created the fellowship and now has several program partners. SHM has joined the list as a program partner in this PSLF with the Health Research and Education Trust (HRET), the American Organization of Nurse Executives (AONE), and the American Society for Healthcare Risk Management (ASHRM).
The ultimate objective of the PSLF is to provide multidisciplinary teams and individual providers with the opportunity to develop the leadership competencies necessary to make meaningful changes in healthcare safety. Through a combination of expert leadership and patient safety faculty, a specially designed curriculum, and field-based projects, PSLF Health Forum Fellowships offer an intensive educational opportunity.
Each fellowship experience is highly participatory and interdisciplinary. Participants from past fellowship classes include physicians, pharmacists, nurses, lawyers, risk managers, educators, administrators, and patients. This environment encourages the creation of new knowledge to advance the patient safety science and enhances interpersonal and professional effectiveness. Each fellowship is a yearlong journey that blends face-to-face leadership retreats, self-study educational curriculum, online computer conferencing, and site visits.
The heart of the fellowship program is an Action Learning Project (ALP) that fellows design and implement in their own organization/community/region. This allows for direct application of each participant’s knowledge and experience gained through the other curricular venues to be immediately applied with the added benefit of being able to draw on the experience of the fellowship faculty and staff to advance the participant’s progress. Fellows are required to provide a midyear and final report to their respective executives and/or boards, in addition to their learning community of fellows during the face-to-face leadership retreats. Examples of ALPs can be found at www.healthforumfellowships.com/healthforumfellowships/html/project.htm.
Through the course of the one-year learning experience, fellows are exposed to the following curricular components:
- Knowledge of what creates safe healthcare systems;
- Leadership, collaboration, and complexity;
- The path to a culture of safety;
- Lessons from inside and outside healthcare;
- Disclosure, reporting, and transparency; and
- The business case for creating a culture of safety.
Given the alignment of interests in quality, patient safety, and leadership between this fellowship and the developing core curriculum in hospital medicine, SHM became a program partner in mid2004. During 2005, SHM will become more involved by serving on the Fellowship’s Advisory and Curriculum Committees to help with oversight of the program concept and curricular development. In addition, SHM will provide one day of educational content drawing from the vast experience of hospitalists in the fields of leadership and patient safety.