This year’s application for the John M. Eisenberg Patient Safety and Quality Awards is now open through Sept. 14. For more than two decades, the award program has recognized the nation’s top individuals and organizations in healthcare for their boundary-breaking work to improve patient safety and quality of care.
Awardees are recognized by The Joint Commission and National Quality Forum in three categories:
- Individual achievement
- National-level innovation
- Local-level innovation
The individual award is intended for nominees who have demonstrated exceptional leadership and scholarship in patient safety and healthcare quality through a substantive body of work.
Initiatives or projects eligible for the National and Local Level awards will have involved successful system changes or interventions that make the environment of care safer or that advocate on the patient’s behalf. These innovative efforts may address new technologies, protocols, procedures, education, organizational culture, legislation, the media, patient advocacy, systems theory, or another area. Organizations applying must provide at minimum one year (12 months) of data supporting the improvement made by the featured initiative.
Interested parties may inquire about eligibility and the application process by contacting EisenbergAwards@qualityforum.org.
Refreshed Accelerate PI™ Dashboard Reports are available for inpatient rehabilitation facilities (IRF), inpatient psychiatric facilities (IPF) and long-term acute care hospitals (LTCH) to provide performance measurement data on a select subset of quality measures.
The updated IPF reports contain data through the fourth quarter of 2020. The updated IRF and LTCH reports contain data through the second quarter of 2021.
Data in the reports comes from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Service (CMS) Compare website. The reports are intended to be a springboard for conversations on performance measures and quality improvement during the survey process, as well as a guide to support an organization’s quality journey.
Reports are located under the “Resources and Tools” menu below the DASH heading in Joint Commission Connect®.
The Joint Commission is developing a new Assisted Living Community (ALC) Memory Care Certification (MCC) program and is seeking input from the field on the new requirements.
This program aims to promote consistent, high-quality dementia care and to assist organizations in providing a safe living environment across the assisted living industry for residents living with dementia. The MCC program is being developed in collaboration with the Alzheimer’s Association and aligns with their Dementia Care Practice Recommendations. The program will include standards requirements addressing the environment, staff training, emergency management, leadership, medication management, resident care, treatment and services, process improvement, and more.
Comment now on the proposed changes. Feedback will be accepted until Sept. 5.
Dateline @ TJC — Diagnostic Overshadowing Worsens Health Disparities: Diagnostic overshadowing, defined as the attribution of symptoms to an existing diagnosis rather than a potential co-morbid condition, has been a problem for decades and is only recently getting the attention it deserves, writes Rick Rader, MD, FAAIDD, FAADM, DHL (hon), Director, Habilitation Center, Orange Grove Center, and Patricia McGaffigan, Vice President, Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI).
Joint Commission Resources, Inc. (JCR) has appointed two world-class and leading healthcare experts to serve as international outside directors on its board of directors: Abdulelah M. Alhawsawi, MD, FRCS©, DABS, and Sangita Reddy. Each appointee will serve a three-year term on the board. Dr. Alhawsawi’s term will begin Oct. 1, 2022, and Ms. Reddy’s term will begin Jan. 1, 2023.
As international outside directors, Dr. Alhawsawi and Ms. Reddy will provide their global expertise and direction to improve safety and quality of healthcare in the United States and abroad. They will be full voting members of the 13-person board of directors, which serves as JCR’s governing body. The board includes healthcare professionals, business executives and quality experts from around the world.
Dr. Alhawsawi is chief executive officer of Novo Genomics, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Novo Genomics is a Saudi biotech company, focused on localizing and applying the latest technologies in genomics/multi-omics, and leveraging data through advanced analytics and data mining to promote health and wellness in the region and beyond. Dr. Alhawsawi is the former founding director general of the Saudi Patient Safety Center (SPSC) and past patient safety advisor to the Saudi Arabia Ministry of Health (MOH). He also led efforts to establish SPSC as a World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Center for patient safety policies and strategies. Dr. Alhawsawi currently serves on WHO’s Global Patient Safety Action Plan Taskforce.
“Dr. Alhawsawi and Ms. Reddy have dedicated their lives to transforming healthcare globally, and we are thrilled to welcome them to Joint Commission Resources’ Board of Directors,” said Jonathan B. Perlin, MD, PhD, MSHA, MACP, FACMI, president and chief executive officer, The Joint Commission. “These board appointments bring unique international expertise and perspective on healthcare policy and the challenges and opportunities to advance quality and safety worldwide.”
Ms. Reddy is joint managing director of Apollo Hospitals Group India, the largest healthcare group in Asia. As one of its founding members, she has promoted multiple, significant initiatives and is committed to transforming the healthcare system through technological advancements and accelerating positive transformation to enable universal access to healthcare. Ms. Reddy is on the Executive Council Committee of NASSCOM India and is the immediate past president of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI). She actively engages with governments and industry bodies on aspects of public health and policy development. The government of India nominated Ms. Reddy to join its Technology Development Board, Department of Science and Technology. Additionally, she holds an honorary doctorate from Macquarie University Australia in recognition of her efforts and commitment to bring transformative changes in healthcare, advance health IT, and champion healthcare initiatives in India and abroad.
“We are so pleased that Dr. Alhawsawi and Ms. Reddy are joining Joint Commission Resources’ Board of Directors,” said Jean Courtney, interim president and chief executive officer, and chief operating officer, JCR. “They each bring in-depth and unparalleled international healthcare expertise. This will be invaluable as JCR continues to expand its mission to improve patient safety and quality of care around the globe.”
Joint Commission Resources (JCR) has updated all six modules of PolicySource. These latest updates to the sample policies and procedures (P&Ps) resource reflect the July 1 standards changes, including:
- New and revised P&Ps to reflect recent changes to Emergency Management (EM) standards for hospitals and critical access hospitals.
- A medication reconciliation policy and environmental safety and security risk identification procedures for behavioral health care and human services organizations.
- An automatic dispensing cabinet override policy and patient complaint resolution policy for ambulatory care organizations and office-based surgery practices.
- Utility system disruption response procedures for home care organizations and hospice and compounding staff competency procedures.
- Test ordering procedures and procedures for investigating suspected transfusion-related adverse events for laboratories.
- Environment of care and emergency management P&Ps for nursing care centers and assisted living community organizations.