Quality and Safety

The CFO of Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New Hampshire, says the move towards value-based payment models helps the hospital emphasize value of care over volume, which reduces readmissions.

There's a great deal at stake in hospital sourcing and the management of medical supplies. A focus on lowering costs by standardized purchasing of drugs or devices can't come at the expense of compromising high-quality care.

Two healthcare organizations have won the the U.S. Commerce Department's annual Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, for providing a high quality patient experience with sustainable financing.

Millions of low-income children are failing to get the free preventive exams and screenings guaranteed by Medicaid and the Obama administration is not doing enough to fix the problem, according to the HHS Office of Inspector General.

Most hospitals already have in place plans to cope with disasters such as tornadoes and plane crashes, but the Ebola virus presents a different challenge. Because of the risk and expense involved, a hospital's CFO should be an integral part of Ebola planning and preparation efforts.

Bon Secours Health System wants to ensure discharged patients get the care and attention they need without being unnecessarily readmitted to the hospital. To that end, they're launching a new population health and care management program.

For some nurses, the emergence of the Ebola virus is increasing a sense of hospital leadership's underinvestment and under-appreciation. The resulting union-driven strikes could cost health systems in their budgets and reputations.

Though supply chain professionals are keenly aware of the importance of quality and cost, their clinical counterparts may not be as familiar with an organized movement to link these two components with patient outcomes.

When Medicare started tracking patient satisfaction in late 2012, and shaving payments to hospitals that fell short, patient experience was put high on hospitals’ agendas. And, as patients’ out-of-pocket costs have risen, they have become savvier, more demanding consumers.

California's public health department has failed to adequately manage investigations of nursing homes statewide, resulting in a backlog of more than 11,000 complaints -- many involving serious safety risks to patients, according to an audit released last week.