The Picker Institute and Planetree announced the formation of the Harvey Picker Center of Innovation and Applied Research Program in Long-Term Care. The goal is "to develop an international hub of research and education with a core focus on identifying and disseminating innovative practices in person-centered long-term care." The Center will assist in translating "evidence-based knowledge to practice in support of sustainable practice improvement for residents, family, and staff across long-term care settings."

The Harvey Picker Center of Innovation and Applied Research Program in Long-Term Care will be "built on the three foundational pillars of research, policy, and practice and will be guided by a Steering Committee of long-term care research, policy, and practice experts—bridging the divides that commonly stymie collaboration across these sectors."

Collaboration among a multi-stakeholder group from key organizations, including Pioneer Network, the American Health Care Association, and LeadingAge, will "ensure that the Center of Innovation's work meets the highest priority needs across long-term care, while also minimizing duplicative efforts across the field and extending the Center of Innovation's reach across the full long-term care spectrum." Read More... 

The Institute for Patient- and Family-Centered Care's newest resources, Partnering with Patients, Residents, and Families: A Resource for Leaders of Hospitals, Ambulatory Care Settings, and Long-Term Care Communities, and the companion video, Partnerships with Patients, Residents, and Families: Leading the Journey, provide a wealth of material, including profiles of how leaders in long term care are partnering with residents and their families to improve the quality and experience of care.

In the recently released report of its Committee on the Learning Health Care System in America, Best Care at Lower Cost: The Path to Continuously Learning Health Care in America, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) embraced patient-centered care as one of the vital components of creating a system that will provide Best Care at Lower Cost.

The President of the IOM, Harvey Fineberg, MD, PhD, wrote that the report presents a "vision of what is possible if the nation applies the resources and tools at hand by marshaling science, information technology, incentives, and care culture to transform the effectiveness and efficiency of care—to produce high-quality health care that continuously learns to be better." Further, Dr. Fineberg stated, "Importantly, the report demonstrates how a health care system that delivers the best care at lower cost is not only necessary, but also possible. The committee has articulated detailed strategies for incorporating continuous learning and improvement into all facets of health care." As stated in Chapter 7 of the report, "When patients, their families, other caregivers, and the public are full, active participants in care, [then] health, the experience of care, and economic outcomes can be substantially improved."

Specifically, one of the report's ten recommendations is to embrace patient-centered care by involving "patients and families in decisions regarding health and health care, tailored to fit their preferences. Patients and families should be given the opportunity to be fully engaged participants at all levels, including individual care decisions, health system learning and improvement activities, and community-based interventions to promote health." According to the report, "a learning health care system is one in which patients and their families are key drivers of the design and operation of the learning process."

View the webcast of the report's release at the National Press Club and see the entire report.

New Yorkers for Patient & Family Empowerment and the
 New York Public Interest Research Group released, in August 2012, Sick, Scared and Separated from Loved Ones ~ A Report on NYS Hospital Visiting Policies and How Patient Centered Approaches Can Promote Wellness and Safer Healthcare. This report presents findings and recommendations based on a review of "visiting" policies and website communications for the 99 acute care hospitals in New York State having 200 or more "staffed beds."

The study shows that many of the surveyed hospitals still take a restrictive, controlling approach to patient "visitation" despite the evidence that family/support person presence reduces medical errors. As noted in the report's summary, "A patient's support person can provide important information, observations and warnings to medical personnel, helping to avert wrongs such as prescription errors—only if the hospital does not bar the door to the patient's room."

The report includes ten recommendations, including:

• If hospitals do not permit 24-hour visitation for a support person, it "should evaluate the potential for adopting a more accommodating policy, looking to more flexible hospitals for guidance."
• Any "restrictions on visiting should be evidence-based," and "hospitals should explore all reasonable alternatives to address an issue before choosing to restrict the patient's access to the support of family, a companion, or friends."
• "Any policy references to visitation being restricted to 'family only' should be corrected immediately to clarify that priority visitors may include other support persons as chosen by the patient."
• In developing visiting policies, hospitals should "obtain input from...others, including patients and their families/support persons..."
• Make sure all sources of information about "visiting," including websites and written policies, are consistent and up-to-date.
  

Interested in learning more about this topic? In addition to being able to see all ten recommendations and access the complete NY state report, visit the Visiting/Family Presence Section of the Institute's website to access more resources and tools on this topic. Profiles, sample policies and procedures, and additional resources are available for free. Also, read about how Anne Arundel Medical Center convened a "Revisiting Visiting Task Force" that included patient and family advisors to address this very issue of family presence.

Welcome to Haley McClelland

The Institute welcomes Haley McClelland, student intern.

Haley, a senior in high school, lives in Bethesda with her parents, and two younger brothers. Haley loves to ski, which she started doing at age 2! In addition to working at the Institute as part of a school internship program, Haley keeps busy studying sign language, finishing her college applications, and participating in extracurricular activities such as her school's dance team and a church youth group.

Haley's work at the Institute includes assisting with a variety of administrative tasks, such as updating databases, processing publication orders, and proof reading documents. She is a great help in assisting the Institute team prepare for its educational meetings, working on both the International Conference and the Intensive Training Seminars.

Haley is a pleasure to work with, and we are so happy she is part of the Institute team.  

The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation launched a national Patient Care Program that seeks to eliminate all preventable harms to patients, and is expected to also decrease health care costs. The new program will focus on both "meaningfully engaging patients and their families in their own health care and developing a systems approach that optimally reconfigures inter-professional teams, processes, and technology to be supportive of that engagement." The Foundation expects to allocate a half billion dollars over ten years if the program develops as anticipated.

Dr. George Bo-Linn, Chief Program Officer for the Patient Care Program, noted that, "Improvements in patient care will be more significant and lasting if patients and their families are actively engaged—especially if we reconfigure clinical processes, care teams, and technology into an integrated whole to focus on patient safety." According to Dr. Bo-Linn, "Much improvement has occurred but too many patients still suffer from lapses in quality and safety. It's ambitious to attempt to prevent all harm, but we must strive for no less." Dr. Bo-Linn added, "We must eliminate all preventable harm—not only medical harms, but also the harm of receiving excessive, inappropriate care; and the harm of losing dignity and respect of one's personhood—that, too, is a measurable harm to be eliminated."

An $8.9 million grant from the Foundation will support a strategic partnership with the Johns Hopkins Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality, where an interdisciplinary team of health care professionals and others will identify ways to eliminate all harm to patients, engage families in the care of their loved ones, and reduce costs beginning in the intensive care unit.

The Foundation's new program is also working with the Institute of Medicine (IOM) that will partner with the National Academy of Engineering, RAND Corporation, Health Affairs, University of California, San Francisco, Stanford University, and others. Read More... 

In a recent blog post, the Hospital Engagement Networks (HENs)* shared the CMS invitation for HENs to sign up and join the Institute for Patient- and Family-Centered Care's PFACnetwork—Patient and Family Advisors and Leaders Listserv—noting that "this forum is designed to facilitate sharing of resources and tools to help implement and promote patient- and family-centered care in hospitals and other health care facilities. The PFACnetwork has hundreds of active members from across the U.S..." Members include hospital representatives, quality improvement officers, nurse managers, patient advocates, and patient and family members "who serve on PFACs or in other advisory capacities."

Learn more about the PFAC listserv and to sign-up...

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*Hospital Engagement Networks, part of the federal Partnership for Patients initiative, are state, regional, national, or hospital system organizations working to develop learning collaboratives, and other activities to improve patient safety.