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April 28, 2004

Targeted Quality Improvement Support

In the Illinois Hospital Association's ongoing effort to encourage and support compliance with the evidence based standards of care for the 'ten measurement starter set, there are some educational programs and new tools IHA is launching. Please keep in mind that the 'ten measurement starter set' is just a beginning as several more measurements will soon be required along with a highly demanded patient experience/satisfaction survey by consumers and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Tools and Resources for Hospital Performance Measurement Improvement Activities IHA is pleased to introduce a new informational series to IHA members that will provide key supporting information and real hospital experiences in striving to improve quality performance improvement. IHA will take each of the ten topic areas over a 30-week period and share valuable evidence-based practice research, intervention tools and strategies, and actual experiences from our Illinois hospitals that have achieved a high level of performance in meeting the standards of care.

As the number of performance measurements for national public reporting increases and the information expands to include the patient experience/satisfaction survey questions, IHA will continue to provide you with this valuable source of information to share within your hospital.

The first topic for the "Tools and Resources for Hospital Performance Measurement Improvement Activities" is Aspirin on Arrival for the performance measurement set of Acute Myocardial Infarction. Please e-mail Tim Philipp, Director of Quality Improvement, at tphilipp@ihastaff.org on any of your valuable hospital experiences and intervention strategies that you would like to share with the Illinois hospital community.

On May 25th and 26th, the IHA in partnership with the Chicago Metropolitan Healthcare Council, and in cooperation with the Illinois Foundation for Quality Health Care (IFQHC - Medicare QIO); is hosting a conference that will provide attendees with information on new developments on performance measurement and quality improvement initiatives.

The American Hospital Association, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois will all be highlighting their new performance initiatives. You will also be able to hear from Memorial Medical Center in Springfield that was the first hospital in the nation to sign on to the "Pay for Performance" pilot project with CMA and Premier hospitals. Additionally, we will have a national speaker on executive leadership in this focused quality improvement era from the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. Also, providers will hear from some of their colleagues that have taken different approaches in engaging and involving their hospital staff in quality improvement and successful achievement of targeted quality goals and objectives.

Next week we will include an update on quality improvement and performance measurement initiatives for the small and rural health care settings as well as an update on discussions on ambulatory measurements and administrative data indicators.

Staff Contact: Pat Merryweather: (630) 276-5590