News Flash!

Check this page to learn more about timely events or happenings that may be relevant to people interested in the delivery of patient- and family-centered care.

SPEAKERLINK is free to register and use until April 1, 2012. After that time, SPEAKERLINK will charge a modest annual membership of $9.95 to host your profile. Speakers have a variety of backgrounds from patients with experience in engaging hospitals, to professional caregivers, to health information technology innovators. The variety of backgrounds, experience levels, and areas of expertise makes SPEAKERLINK an excellent resource for stories to improve healthcare. Read More...

Building Leadership to Improve Patient Based Care

The seminar, held in Sydney in July 2011, was a great success. The seminar was jointly hosted by the Clinical Excellence Commission (CEC) and the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care. This program is designed to assist in building leadership skills to face the challenge of shaping organisations to support improved patient care experience. Read More...

Don Berwick, a Harvard pediatrics and health policy professor who is one of the nation's leading champions of high-quality, patient-centered care, leaves the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), after 17 months. Dr. Berwick receives high marks on his tenure there. Read More...

Guidelines for Poster Presentations for the 5th International Conference just added

Poster presentations should clearly illustrate the core concepts of patient- and family-centered care and emphasize collaboration with patients and families.
Read more...

Congratulations to Bev Johnson, President and CEO of the Institute. At the 2nd Annual Dorland Health People Awards on October 20, 2011, Bev received an honorary award for her leadership in the area of patient- and family-centered care. Presented at the National Press Club, in Washington, DC, these awards honor "excellence and dedication among healthcare professionals" and seek to recognize "those who provide outstanding patient care and system improvements across the diverse healthcare landscape."

The Institute is proud to announce the results of the 2011 Salary Survey of Patient and Family Leaders in Paid Positions. The Institute highlighted the survey results at its Hospitals and Communities Moving Forward with Patient- and Family-Centered Care Intensive Training Seminar in Madison, Wisconsin, November 7-10, 2011, in the session, Creating Paid Positions for Patient and Family Leaders: Key Considerations.

The survey responses offer a glimpse into the patient- and family-centered care community, as well as current attitudes and trends for engaging patients and family leaders as paid employees. Results reflect the importance of bringing patients and families in as part of the health care team to represent the voices of patients and families in day-to-day operations. Read More...

The new Multi-professional Patient Safety Curriculum Guide released in October 2011 by WHO Patient Safety assists universities and schools in the fields of dentistry, medicine, midwifery, nursing and pharmacy to teach patient safety. It also supports the training of all health-care professionals on a number of priority patient safety concepts to improve learning about patient safety. Read More...

The U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality's Healthcare 411 audio news source provides practical health care information, research findings, and data to help consumers, health providers, health insurers, researchers, and policymakers make informed decisions about health care issues.

October 1, 2011 marked the exciting one-year anniversary of state-mandated Patient and Family Advisory Councils (PFACs) in all Massachusetts hospitals. The same state law that requires the establishment of these PFACs also requires each Massachusetts hospital to publish an annual report summarizing the work of the hospital's council. Many of the hospitals have posted on their websites either their annual PFAC reports, other information about their PFACs, or both. Read More...

The Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) Open School offers a range of on-line courses on topics such as patient- and family-centered care, quality improvement, patient safety, and leadership. IHI just announced a new course: Patient- and Family-Centered Care 101: Dignity and Respect. Continuing Education Credits are available. The Course is now live on the IHI website.

The Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) announced the Pilot Projects Grant Program. PCORI intends to commit up to $26 million to this program-$13 million per year for two years-in support of approximately 40 awards.

The purpose of the Pilot Projects Grants Program is to:

Inform PCORI's ongoing development and enhancement of national priorities for patient-centered outcomes research (PCOR);
Support the collection of preliminary data that can provide a platform for an evolving research agenda; and
Support the identification of research methodology to advance PCOR.

As part of PCORI's commitment to include patient and stakeholder perspectives throughout the research process, the organization is encouraging applications that collaboratively bring together experienced researchers and individuals or organizations that represent patients, caregivers and the broader health care community.

According to the announcement, "PCORI is interested in the development of research methods, patient-oriented outcomes instruments, patient-provider communication and other decision-making strategies, building collaborative research teams with stakeholders, translating research findings into clinical practice, stakeholder engagement, and research agenda setting strategies that can be used in future comparative effectiveness research."

Letters of intent for must be received by November 1, 2011, and applications must be received by December 1, 2011. For more information...

Oregon established the Oregon Patient-Centered Care Primary Care Home Program, and convened a multi-disciplinary implementation task force that includes patient and family advisors. Read More...

Check out the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) new training simulation, Partnering to Heal: Teaming-Up Against Healthcare-Associated Infections. It is a great training tool for use by health professionals, students, patients, and their families to learn more about patient safety concepts.

Participants can choose to play any of five different roles—four health care professionals as well as a family member—and make decisions based on the situations each encounters. Players can then see how those decisions play out for each of the characters. This simulation is intended to encourage different audiences to understand the goal of preventing infections and to make the personal commitment to prevent Healthcare-Associated Infections (HAIs). Learn more about the HHS Initiative to Prevent Healthcare-Associated Infections.

Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services, visited University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina/Vidant Health (UHS)—an Institute Pinwheel Sponsor. Secretary Sebelius' visit was to support the Partnership for Patients, a nationwide effort to improve health care quality. UHS, which "engages patients in meaningful partnerships from the bedside to the board room" is a leader in patient safety. UHS attributes its gains in reducing patient harm and improving safety-such as reducing hospital-acquired infections by 50% over two years-to several factors, including its "leadership's firm commitment to improving quality, patient safety and patient experience; embracing transparency and involving patients and families in system decision-making." See video clip.

Margaret Murphy named as Expert Lead, Patients for Patient Safety, World Health Organization. Learn more about Margaret Murphy and more about other WHO Patient Safety Expert Leads...

Picker Institute Always Events℠ Challenge Grant Recipients Announced!

The Picker Institute has determined that an operating principle focused on the concept of Always Events℠ can be implemented to drive the health care system to become more patient-centered. In contrast to the well-known Joint Commission "never events" patient-focused Always Events are aspects of the patient and family experience that should always occur when patients interact with healthcare professionals and the healthcare delivery system. Challenge Grants of $50,000 were awarded on 3/18/2011 to 20 winning applicants. To read about the recipients...

Institute for Healthcare Improvement: Achieving an Exceptional Patient and Family Experience of Inpatient Hospital Care

Just released, Achieving an Exceptional Patient and Family Experience of Inpatient Hospital Care, is one of the IHI Innovation Series White Papers.

The Institute for Healthcare Improvement conducted an in-depth review of the research, studied exemplar organizations, and interviewed experts in the field, in response to growing interest from the hospital community in better understanding and improving the experience of patients and their families during hospitalization. IHI sought to identify the primary and secondary drivers of exceptional patient and family inpatient hospital experience (defined as care that is patient-centered, safe, effective, timely, efficient, and equitable), as measured by the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) survey's "willingness to recommend" the hospital.

The project identified five primary drivers of exceptional patient and family inpatient hospital experience of care:

leadership;
staff hearts and minds;
respectful partnership;
reliable care; and
evidence-based care.

Bedside Nurse Change of Shift Report Video

The Institute for Patient- and Family-Centered Care just released a new video, Bedside Nurse Change of Shift Report. This training clip presents two nurses and an adult patient participating in an actual bedside nurse change of shift report at Perham Memorial Hospital and Home in Perham, MN. Read More....

Families as Educators: Guidance for Implementation

The Initiative for Pediatric Palliative Care (IPPC) is a broad-based collaborative initiative of several organizations and a number of leading children's hospitals. The IPPC works to educate and improve quality of care to enhance family-centered care for children living with life-threatening conditions. The IPPC offers a variety of free resources on its website, including it's curriculum, and a variety of tools.

IPPC educational retreats introduce interdisciplinary teams—including family members—from a variety of health care settings to the IPPC curriculum and prepare the teams to lead educational and organizational change. The retreats incorporate a significant number of family members to participate as co-teachers and co-learners with health care professionals. Families as Educators: Guidance for Implementation—available as a free download—provides practical guidance to help other institutions understand this model and adapt it to their own settings. The Kenneth B. Schwartz Center supported the "Families as Educators" component of IPPC with four years of funding.

New to Pinwheel Sponsors

Pinwheel Sponsors now have the opportunity to designate their affiliation with the Institute by posting the Institute's Emblem of Commitment on their own website. This emblem lets others know that the Sponsor's organization is committed to partnering with patients and families to improve safety and quality. Learn more about the Institute's Pinwheel Sponsors Program...

NEW NICQ 2007 eBook available

The Vermont Oxford Network new eBook entitled NICQ 2007: Improvement in Action is now available. This eBook is the culmination of NICQ 2007, a two-year improvement collaborative involving teams of neonatal professionals and families representing 46 hospitals in North America. The goal is to consistently provide care that is family-centered, safe, effective, equitable, efficient, timely, and socially and environmentally responsible. The first chapter, Advancing Patient- and Family-Centered Newborn Intensive Care, is co-authored by James Conway, Joanna Celenza, and the Institute's Senior Policy and Program Specialist, Marie Abraham. This entire book is available to download, as are individual chapters. Read more...