Hospitals in pursuit of excellence

The 2016 chairman's columns have focused on  inspiring stories about hospitals and health systems...

Quality and safety are “top of the agenda” at urban and rural hospitals across the country. At Ho...

Hospitals are working to achieve all elements of the Triple Aim by redesigning traditional ways o...

Hospitals and health systems are intensifying their focus to ensure all patients receive high-qua...

MedEx Bedside Prescription Delivery is the very first bedside medication delivery service for hos...

Homelessness is a hidden but real issue in Chittenden County, VT. University of Vermont Medical C...

Since 2012, the Aiming for Zero program at Northwell Hospital is continuously working to reduce C...

At hospitals and health care systems across the country, executives, clinicians and staff are lea...

The best way to prevent catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTI) is to limit the use ...

Reducing and eliminating patient harm are at the forefront of patient safety and continue to be a...

According to the 2008 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention/National Center for Health Stati...

The systemwide Obstetrics Care Excellence Team was formed to improve quality of care and reduce c...

Bronchiolitis, one of the most costly and frequent medical diagnoses seen at the hospital, is a s...

Today more than ever, it is important to focus on reducing unnecessary testing and unneeded emerg...

In response to high readmission rates coming from the health system’s skilled nursing facility (S...

In 2008, the health system’s program to contact discharged emergency department (ED) and immediat...

The facility partnered with local emergency medical services (EMS) providers to improve early rec...

Chronic wounds are a growing problem in the United States. Based on evidence-based research of re...

The problem faced by the health system was the lack of a coordinated approach for the review and ...

The hospital identified two process improvement opportunities related to medication safety effort...

The Reducing Readmissions: Making Data Real project decreased acute rehospitalization rates by al...

The goal of this project was to standardize protocols for controlling patient pain following tota...

Managing the flow of patient throughput is essential to preventing overcrowding in the emergency ...

Venous thromboembolism (VTE), defined as a deep vein thrombosis and/or pulmonary emboli, is linke...

Turnaround time for immunohistochemistry (IHC) stains in the laboratory of a 500 bed tertiary car...

The goal was to reduce delay in patient care by decreasing patient wait times for a CT exam from ...

Operational and physician leaders identified an opportunity to decrease the use of off-site telem...

Surgical site infections (SSI) lead to patient suffering, morbidity and mortality, extended lengt...

This project has decreased cycle time for medication reconciliation at time of admission and for ...

The CK-MB Test is a traditional blood test of a cardiac marker used to assist in the diagnosis of...

Studies show lipase to be as sensitive as and more specific than amylase in diagnosing pancreatit...

The 2012 New England Compounding Center tragedy and ongoing drug shortages have caused a dramatic...

Evidence-based practice supports early goal-directed therapy for patients with sepsis. Improving ...

The organization sought to create a root cause analysis (RCA) structure that endowed greater focu...

Troponin is a cardiac marker for acute myocardial infarction, making this lab test a key part of ...

The emergency department (ED) was experiencing an increase in door-to-doctor times due to high pa...

The organization used Lean Six Sigma process techniques to identify and support improved efficien...

Medical dispense overrides allow nurses to dispense medications from the Pyxis machine without ph...

Patient falls during hospitalization can lead to increased inpatient care costs, decreased patien...

The neurosurgery service at this Level I trauma center had experienced high rates of surgical sit...

Boarding patients in the emergency department (ED) is detrimental to patient care, and evidence s...

The health system did not have an adequate process for notifying staff when a patient was on cont...

Inappropriate stress ulcer prophylaxis is a serious problem across the health care continuum. Lit...

In 2013, the facility’s hospital-onset (HO) infection rate for Clostridium difficile (C. diff) ha...

A review of the hospital’s quality indicators revealed an unacceptable rate of catheter-associate...

Although episiotomy was once considered a routine part of childbirth, in recent years, there has ...

The hospital’s venous thromboembolism (VTE) rate for total joint patients was 36.2 in 2011 and 37...

The ultimate goal for patients who are mechanically ventilated is to promptly and safely disconti...

High rates of hospital readmissions in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD)...

For several years, the hospital has been focused on reducing 30-day readmissions. After learning ...