Curing the System - improvingchroniccare.org

1 TodayFOR AMERICA S HEALTHMAY 2002 THE NATIONAL COALITION ON health CARETHE institute FOR healthcare IMPROVEMENTS tories of Change inChronic Illness CareCuring the SystemTHE NATIONAL COALITION ON health CARENCHC is the nation s most broadly representative alliance working to improve America shealth and health care . It is comprised of 80 member organizations. They include someof the nation s largest businesses, labor unions, health care providers, consumers groupsreligious organizations, foundations, and health and pension funds. The Coalition wasfounded in 1990. It is non-profit and non-partisan.

2 Its members are united in the beliefthat America needs better, more affordable health care and that all Americans shouldhave health insurance. Former Presidents George Bush, Jimmy Carter, and Gerald R. Fordserve as the Coalition s Honorary Co-Chairs. Former Iowa Governor Robert D. Ray andformer Congressman Paul G. Rogers of Florida are the Coalition s Co-Chairmen. NCHCis in Washington, DC. Founder and President Henry E. Simmons, , , ,is a widely respected pioneer in the field of health quality assessment and improvement . THE institute FOR healthcare IMPROVEMENTIHI is an independent, non-profit education and research organization based in Boston,MA.

3 It was founded in 1991 with the goal of fostering collaboration among health careorganizations to improve the quality of health care . IHI each year holds a wide arrayof educational forums, symposia and workshops, and demonstration projects for med-ical professionals and health care administrators. IHI s co-founder and president, DonaldM. Berwick, , , a practicing pediatrician and clinical professor at HarvardMedical School, is one of the nation s leading authorities on health care quality. Accelerating Change Today ( )FOR AMERICA S is a collaborative initiative of the National Coalition onHealth care and the institute for healthcare improvement .

4 Itaims to improve the quality of health care in the United Statesthrough the identification of best practices and administrativeand clinical innovations that are: (1) yielding better patient out-comes; (2) making the delivery of care more efficient; (3) increas-ing access to timely medical care ; (4) making the health systemeasier to use; (5) lowering costs, and (6) reducing medical errorsand inappropriate care . The initiative seeks to accelerate thespread of best practices and innovations throughout the healthsystem by publishing them and through presentations at medicalmeetings and health care and business symposia.

5 A central pur-pose is to make a broad range of health care stakeholders,including consumers and those who pay the health care bill,more aware of cutting-edge efforts to improve the quality ofhealth care . The initiative will actively encourage the replicationof best practices in health care facilities. About This PublicationThis report presents the stories ofindividuals, institutions, and organi-zations that made a commitment tochange and innovation to improvechronic illness care . The profilesreflect some of the most promisingpioneering efforts underway in thisfield.

6 The team of experts identifiedin the Credits and Acknowledge-ments developed selection criteriaand determined those to be final choices represent thelarger group of meaningful andlaudable efforts underway nation-wide to improve chronic diseasemanagement. Profiles of individuals, institutions, andorganizations thathave demonstratedexcellence in chronicdisease TodayFOR AMERICA S HEALTHMAY 2002 Curing the SystemTHE NATIONAL COALITION ON health CARETHE institute FOR healthcare IMPROVEMENTC redits and AcknowledgementsTeam Co-Leader EDWARD H. WAGNER, , , Wagner is a general internist/epidemiologist and Director of the MacColl Institutefor healthcare Innovation at the Center for health Studies (CHS), Group health Cooperativeof Puget Sound.

7 He is also Professor of health Services at the University of Washington Schoolof Public health and Community Medicine. He directs Improving Chronic Illness care (ICIC),a national program of The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The overall goal of ICIC is toassist health systems improve their care of chronic illness through quality improvement andevaluation, research, and dissemination. More than 500 American and international healthcare organizations have been involved in ICIC-guided quality improvement Co-Leader CONNIE DAVIS, , Davis is a geriatric nurse practitioner at the Center for health Studies, Group HealthCooperative of Puget Sound and the Associate Director for Clinical improvement of Improving Chronic Illness care .

8 She is a member of the clinical faculty of the University ofWashington. She is the author or co-author of numerous publications on health promotionand chronic illness care and a frequent speaker regarding improving chronic illness MemberCHARLES J. HOMER, , Homer is Executive Director of the National Initiative for Children s healthcare Quality,an education and research organization dedicated to improvement of the quality of children shealth care . He is an associate professor of pediatrics and of public health at HarvardUniversity and is a member of the third Preventive Services Task Force.

9 He currentlyserves as chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Steering Committee on QualityImprovement and Management and is also principal investigator of several federally fundedstudies of quality improvement in child health . Team MemberSTEVEN D. HAGEDORN, Hagedorn, assistant professor of Family Medicine, is a member of the Mayo ClinicRochester Family Medicine staff. For 12 years he has been involved in numerous activitiesrelated to disease management and clinical quality improvement . From 1997 to 2001, heserved as Vice Chair of the Mayo Clinic Rochester Continuous improvement Council and iscurrently its Acting Chair.

10 He is studying complexity theory and its implications for healthcare through a doctorate program on organizational change at the Center for Complexity andManagement at the University of Hertfordshire, MemberBRIAN AUSTINB rian Austin is Deputy Director of Improving Chronic Illness care , with responsibility foroverall administrative leadership of the program. He is active in all aspects of ICIC, with aspecial interest in incorporating new technologies into the primary care setting and the devel-opment of expert systems and improved practice team communication methods to enhancecare KAPLANAbbi Kaplan conducted the interviews and wrote this publication.