National Performance Improvement Award Given To Children's Hospitals
Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center and Arkansas Children's Hospital have been named recipients of the "RACE for Results" award given by Child Health Corporation of America (CHCA), the nationÂ’s only business alliance of childrenÂ’s hospitals. The national award recognizes excellence in performance improvement within childrenÂ’s hospitals, particularly in areas of significant and sustained improvements in patient care, quality and safety.
OVERLAND PARK, KS (PRWEB) April 26, 2004
The nation’s only business alliance of children’s hospitals, Child Health Corporation of America (CHCA), Overland Park, KS, announced today that two of its Owner Hospitals have received CHCA’s distinguished “RACE for Results” award recognizing and celebrating excellence in performance improvement within children’s hospitals. Recipients of the award are Arkansas Children’s Hospital, Little Rock, AR, and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. CHCA is a business alliance of 41 of North America’s leading children’s hospitals.
The “RACE for Results” awards are sponsored by CHCA’s Performance Improvement division, which delivers a range of quality and safety programs and services for Owner children’s hospitals. The “RACE for Results” awards are given to children’s hospitals that demonstrate significant and sustained improvements in care through the use of CHCA’s Pediatric Health Information System (PHIS) and/or Child Health Accountability Initiative (CHAI) rapid improvement collaborative. This year’s winners were selected from 13 entries representing children’s hospitals across the United States. Judges included David Classen, M. D., M. S., First Consulting Group, Carol Haraden, PhD., Institute for Healthcare Improvement, and Brent James, M. D., MStat, Institute for Health Care Delivery Research.
Says Donna Payne, Senior Vice President of Performance Improvement at CHCA, “Over the years, our Owner Hospitals have found increasing value by using PHIS and CHAI to reduce variances in care, reduce costs, establish best practices and improve patient safety. This year’s “RACE for Results” winners demonstrate the tremendous power and benefits that our services bring to their clinical practices.”
Arkansas Children’s Hospital was selected as a 2004 “RACE for Results” winner for its ongoing efforts to improve patient safety, particularly in the area of catheter-related blood stream infection rates in the PICU. Steady and significant decreases in the catheter-related blood stream infection rate since beginning rapid cycle improvements saved the hospital an estimated $784,261 in costs and 243 PICU days potentially attributable to CR-BSIs annually.
Arkansas ChildrenÂ’s participation in CHCAÂ’s CHAI rapid cycle focus group helped them implement repeated rapid cycle improvements and achieve and sustain improvement in blood stream infections. To measure progress, the CHCA PHIS database helped Arkansas quantify volumes and estimate cost savings.
Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center earned a 2004 “RACE for Results” award for its significant strides in optimizing health outcomes for children with asthma and bronchiolitis. Through a series of processes that involved multidisciplinary teams developing and implementing asthma and bronchiolitis point-of-care treatment algorithms, scoring and treatment recommendations, clinical criteria for admission, discharge and intensive care, clinical pathways and patient education materials, Cincinnati Children’s was able to reduce hospitalization, costs and length of stays when hospitalization was needed.
Cincinnati ChildrenÂ’s uses CHCA PHIS data to help them identify baseline best practices. These serve as a starting point for discussion on current state as the teams refine their processes to provide community-wide, family - and patient-centered, evidence-based care for children with acute illnesses. Asthma and bronchiolitis treatment practices are just two conditions for which PHIS data has helped them improve clinical practices.
CHCA is a business alliance of 41 of North AmericaÂ’s leading childrenÂ’s hospitals that provides a range of products and services designed to reduce costs, increase revenue and enhance the competitive position of childrenÂ’s hospitals. CHCA represents more than 20,000 physicians, 98,000 employees, $11 billion in revenue and $1.8 billion in overall medical/surgical and pharmaceutical products. You can learn more about CHCA at www. chca. com.
