Of particular note is the involvement of five hospitalists in AHRQ-funded research. Jeff Greenwald, MD, Brian Jack, MD, Greg Maynard, MD, MS, Tosha Wetterneck, MD, and Mark Williams, MD, are each involved with quality improvement and patient safety research through AHRQ grants. (See The Hospitalist, June issue, p. 35.)
Doctors Jack and Greenwald are partners in researching the re-engineering of the hospital discharge process—a process that they note is not standardized and is often marked with poor quality as observed by the frequency of post-discharge adverse events and 30 day re-hospitalization rates—to improve patient safety. They have grants through AHRQ’s Partnerships in Implementing Patient Safety (PIPS) and Safe Practices Risk Assessment Challenge Grants (SPRACGS) research initiatives and presented their work as a part of track two.
Dr. Maynard is also funded through AHRQ’s PIPS research initiative as his research pursues the elimination of hospital-acquired venous thromboembolism (VTE). Noting that easy and cost effective prophylactic treatment exists, but is underutilized, Greg’s project involves the creation of a toolkit that allows institutions to acquire optimal prevention of hospital-acquired VTE, ultimately reducing morbidity, mortality, and the associated but unnecessary costs.
Dr. Wetterneck presented her work on medication administration technologies as a part of track four. Her research has focused on the development and evaluation of Smart IV pump technology that has been designed with human factors in mind.
Dr. Williams presented, along with John Bajha, PhD, his research on Hospital Patient Safe-D(ischarge). This initiative is funded by a PIPS grant and was presented as a part of track five. The project intends to first implement a “discharge bundle” that consists of medication reconciliation, patient-centered hospital discharge education, and a post-discharge continuity check by a clinician. Once the discharge bundle is established, its level of adoption and acceptance will be evaluated before the researchers develop an “implementation toolkit” for dissemination of the bundle. The bundle will be disseminated with the intended result of safer discharges.
The Patient Safety and Health IT Conference concluded on National Health IT Day and the start of the HIMSS Summit. Speakers included Dr. Clancy; Newt Gingrich, former speaker of the House and founder of the Center for Health Transformation; David Brailer, national coordinator for Health Information Technology; and Mark McClellan, MD, PhD, administrator of Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Additional panels throughout the day included leaders from outside of healthcare: David Hom, vice president, human resources strategic initiatives, Pitney Bowes; Bruce Bradley, director, health plan strategy and public policy, General Motors; and Dale Whitney, corporate health care manager, United Parcel Service; as well as a number of leaders from within the healthcare field who are actively involved with health IT implementation.
Ultimately, the day’s topics highlighted the importance of leveraging health IT in the pursuit of improved patient safety from the perspectives of policymakers, business leaders, and healthcare leaders and successfully served as a transition to the HIMSS Summit. TH
Resources
- For more information about the conference visit: http://healthit.ahrq.gov/PatientSafetyandHIT2006Conference.
- Webcasts and transcripts of the last day of the conference have been provided by the Kaiser Family Foundation: www.kaisernetwork.org/health_cast/hcast_index.cfm?display=detail&hc=1731