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To Our Readers
The Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety
To Our Readers
T
his journal is dedicated to helping researchers, clinicians, and quality and patient safety professionals translate knowledge into practical solutions. Leading experts and practitioners in the United States and the rest of the world, as members of the Journal’s Editorial Advisory Board, ensure that the articles contribute to the knowledge about the important quality and patient safety issues in health care and the implementation of strategies and methods to address them. Please join The Joint Commission and Joint Commission Resources in welcoming the seven new Editorial Advisory Board members for 2008. The new Editorial Advisory Board members bring diversity in background and experience reflective of health care in general. However, whether through direct patient care, administration, research, teaching, mentoring, or other professional service, they all demonstrate a commitment to improvement of quality and patient safety. Dale W. Bratzler has dedicated much of his career to facilitating continuous quality improvement by helping health care organizations share interventions, intervention tools, and information on effective methods for improving processes and patient care outcomes—and for sustaining the gains. Dr. Bratzler has actively participated in the coordination of the Surgical Infection Prevention (SIP) project since its initiation in 2002 and helps to coordinate the Surgical Care Improvement Project (SCIP), the national quality improvement project designed to improve surgical care in hospitals, which has replaced SIP. As a leader in quality assessment and improvement in behavioral health care, Richard Hermann has investigated topics such as practice variation, appropriateness of clinical practices, risk adjustment, and cost-effectiveness. His current research examines organizational determinants of effective measurement-based quality improvement. Ashish Jha has focused on adoption of health information technology as a potential solution for improving care, health care disparities as a marker of poor quality of care, and how hospitals can best deploy quality improvement initiatives. As part of his work in determining the impact
January 2008
and the unintended consequences of quality improvement tools such as public reporting, he has been working on a series of analyses on the Hospital Quality Alliance initiative to publicly report hospital quality data for common medical conditions. Janet Nagamine, who has had experience as an intensive care unit nurse, a hospitalist, a patient safety leader, and an assistant chief of quality, works as a hospitalist and also consults with hospitals on teamwork, communication, safety culture, and implementation of patient safety best practices. Dr. Nagamine, who is chairperson of the Society of Hospital Medicine’s quality and patient safety committee, believes that hospitalists have a professional as well as a personal stake in creating a hospital and a system that is safe and high performing. Lisa Schilling, expert in the application and spread of evidence-based practice and in creating reliable systems of care, works with leaders and delivery teams to design and implement strategies that result in sustained performance. Gordon D. Schiff, who had spent his entire career at Cook County Hospital, has recently left Chicago to pursue his interests in quality and safety at Harvard’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Dr. Schiff is an expert in quality improvement, computerized physician order entry, informatics, laboratory test follow-up, diagnostic error, medication reconciliation, and access and health reform. The Journal is committed to the improvement of quality and safety not just in hospitals but in all health care settings, as reflected in the appointment of Wilson D. Pace. Dr. Pace is a leading proponent of ambulatory safety, particularly in primary care or office practice, with special interests in information technology, medication safety, laboratory and imaging issues, decision support, and patient-centered care. The Journal thanks you, our readers, for your commitment to identifying and implementing the best possible solutions in quality and patient safety for your organizations and the patients you serve. As always, we invite you to contribute your own implementation stories. —Steven Berman, Executive Editor
Volume 34 Number 1
Copyright 2008 Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations
3
To Our Readers
T
his journal is dedicated to helping researchers, clinicians, and quality and patient safety professionals translate knowledge into practical solutions. Leading experts and practitioners in the United States and the rest of the world, as members of the Journal’s Editorial Advisory Board, ensure that the articles contribute to the knowledge about the important quality and patient safety issues in health care and the implementation of strategies and methods to address them. Please join The Joint Commission and Joint Commission Resources in welcoming the seven new Editorial Advisory Board members for 2008. The new Editorial Advisory Board members bring diversity in background and experience reflective of health care in general. However, whether through direct patient care, administration, research, teaching, mentoring, or other professional service, they all demonstrate a commitment to improvement of quality and patient safety. Dale W. Bratzler has dedicated much of his career to facilitating continuous quality improvement by helping health care organizations share interventions, intervention tools, and information on effective methods for improving processes and patient care outcomes—and for sustaining the gains. Dr. Bratzler has actively participated in the coordination of the Surgical Infection Prevention (SIP) project since its initiation in 2002 and helps to coordinate the Surgical Care Improvement Project (SCIP), the national quality improvement project designed to improve surgical care in hospitals, which has replaced SIP. As a leader in quality assessment and improvement in behavioral health care, Richard Hermann has investigated topics such as practice variation, appropriateness of clinical practices, risk adjustment, and cost-effectiveness. His current research examines organizational determinants of effective measurement-based quality improvement. Ashish Jha has focused on adoption of health information technology as a potential solution for improving care, health care disparities as a marker of poor quality of care, and how hospitals can best deploy quality improvement initiatives. As part of his work in determining the impact
January 2008
and the unintended consequences of quality improvement tools such as public reporting, he has been working on a series of analyses on the Hospital Quality Alliance initiative to publicly report hospital quality data for common medical conditions. Janet Nagamine, who has had experience as an intensive care unit nurse, a hospitalist, a patient safety leader, and an assistant chief of quality, works as a hospitalist and also consults with hospitals on teamwork, communication, safety culture, and implementation of patient safety best practices. Dr. Nagamine, who is chairperson of the Society of Hospital Medicine’s quality and patient safety committee, believes that hospitalists have a professional as well as a personal stake in creating a hospital and a system that is safe and high performing. Lisa Schilling, expert in the application and spread of evidence-based practice and in creating reliable systems of care, works with leaders and delivery teams to design and implement strategies that result in sustained performance. Gordon D. Schiff, who had spent his entire career at Cook County Hospital, has recently left Chicago to pursue his interests in quality and safety at Harvard’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Dr. Schiff is an expert in quality improvement, computerized physician order entry, informatics, laboratory test follow-up, diagnostic error, medication reconciliation, and access and health reform. The Journal is committed to the improvement of quality and safety not just in hospitals but in all health care settings, as reflected in the appointment of Wilson D. Pace. Dr. Pace is a leading proponent of ambulatory safety, particularly in primary care or office practice, with special interests in information technology, medication safety, laboratory and imaging issues, decision support, and patient-centered care. The Journal thanks you, our readers, for your commitment to identifying and implementing the best possible solutions in quality and patient safety for your organizations and the patients you serve. As always, we invite you to contribute your own implementation stories. —Steven Berman, Executive Editor
Volume 34 Number 1
Copyright 2008 Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations
3