The Joint Commission has joined the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health’s Sync for Social Needs coalition, committing to a role in ending hunger and reducing diet-related disease in the United States by 2030.
The Sync for Social Needs coalition brings together leading healthcare organizations and healthcare technology companies that aim to integrate nutrition information within a patient’s electronic health record via a standardized, Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR)-based approach.
As the standards-setting organization for more than 22,000 U.S. healthcare organizations, The Joint Commission is committed to working with participants to scale implementation to lower clinician burden to screen for social needs.
The Joint Commission recognizes that the social determinants of health (SDOH), the conditions in the environments where people live, learn, work, and play, can limit an individual’s access to nutritious foods. Americans who lack access to nutritious food are disproportionately low-income, Black or Hispanic, or live in rural areas. Standardizing SDOH data collection and sharing is a crucial step in understanding and addressing the nature and extent of the problem at hand.
“Health equity is among The Joint Commission’s highest priorities,” said Jonathan B. Perlin, MD, PhD, MSHA, MACP, FACMI, president and chief executive officer, The Joint Commission. “By standardizing the collection and sharing of social determinants of health data, clinicians can be better prepared to tailor a patient’s care to their environment, access, and abilities. The Joint Commission looks forward to collaborating with some of the United States’ leading healthcare organizations to address the social determinants of health that contribute to food insecurity.”
Other member organizations of the Sync for Social Needs coalition include the Department of Veterans Affairs, National Quality Forum, National Committee for Quality Assurance, HL7 International, Epic, Oracle-Cerner, Rush University System for Health, Tufts Medicine, Riverside Health System, SCAN Health Plan, Sanford Health, SSM Health, Higi, BayCare, Geisinger, Meditech, FindHelp, Wellsky, UniteUs, Graphite Health, Saffron Labs, and XanthosHealth.
Learn more about the Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health and the Sync for Social Needs coalition. Also, furthering its commitment to health equity, The Joint Commission recently released new and revised requirements to reduce healthcare disparities that will go into effect on Jan. 1, 2023.
Several revisions have been made to requirements in the Environment of Care (EC) and Life Safety (LS) chapters for certain Joint Commission accreditation programs. The changes include revised elements of performance (EPs) that clarify and/or strengthen expectations for accredited organizations as they relate to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) codes.
The changes — which will take effect Jan. 1, 2023 — are for the following programs:
- Hospital
- Critical Access Hospital
- Ambulatory Health Care
- Assisted Living Communities
- Behavioral Health Care and Human Services
- Home Care
- Nursing Care Centers
- Office-Based Surgery
View the prepublication standards.
Torrance Memorial Medical Center is the first in the nation to receive the Leading Laboratories recognition from The Joint Commission and the American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP). The two-year designation serves as proof of Torrance Memorial’s commitment to laboratory excellence and to help improve patient outcomes.
Torrance Memorial underwent a rigorous application process to receive the recognition, including a review of its outcomes, indicators, metrics, and evidence. Additionally, it had to demonstrate excellence in four key areas:
- Elevating quality outcomes
- Supporting professional development
- Cultivating trusted leadership
- Promoting laboratory visibility
With a focus on building a high-quality, state-of-the-art laboratory, the Torrance Memorial Department of Pathology and Clinical Laboratory (DPCL) initiated a five-year strategic plan based on six key pillars:
- People and culture
- Quality
- Financials
- Innovation
- Education
- Growth
In 2021, DPCL implemented a robust quality management program. The quality program helped define, establish, and maintain a collaborative, systematic, and organization-wide approach to quality management. Additional initiatives have included implementing core lab automation to reduce the outsourcing of select tests, increasing volume of outreach business, reducing turn-around-time, and improving efficiency and productivity. Through a newly produced quarterly newsletter, the DPCL expanded engagement and increased visibility of these new innovations.
Central to the growth of the DPCL was the need to develop high-performing teams. In addition to supporting career development, lab leadership engaged in regular rounding to foster a motivating work climate – recognizing and rewarding outstanding team and individual contributions.
“It is an honor to be the first in the nation to receive the Leading Laboratories recognition,” said Keith Hobbs, Executive Vice President, Torrance Memorial Medical Center. “This designation reflects the commitment to excellence by every member of the Torrance Memorial Pathology and Clinical Laboratory.”
“We congratulate Torrance Memorial Medical Center on being the first in the nation to receive the Leading Laboratories recognition,” added Heather Hurley, Executive Director, Laboratory Accreditation, The Joint Commission. “As the first hospital laboratory to receive this designation, Torrance Memorial is demonstrating its commitment to laboratory staff through professional development and trusted leadership. It also is promoting laboratory visibility, including the complex work of laboratory staff to provide the continuum of care, to its organization, patients, and community.”
The Leading Laboratories recognition — developed and refined by laboratory leaders — is available to all Joint Commission-accredited hospital laboratories. Learn more about the Leading Laboratories recognition.
A Continuous Customer Engagement (CCE) webinar focused on reducing falls for ambulatory surgical centers is scheduled for Oct. 26 at 9 a.m. PT / 10 a.m. MT / 11 a.m. CT / noon ET.
The aim of this one-hour webinar is to provide an opportunity for accredited ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs) to learn from peers that have exceled at this topic. Azura Surgery Center Las Vegas and Fresenius Vascular Center Dayton will share their best practices and lessons learned in achieving and sustaining impressive outcomes.
At the end of the session, participants should be able to:
- Apply concepts learned about evidence-based best practices regarding patient falls within ASCs.
- Identify common performance and outcome challenges regarding patient falls within ASCs.
- Prepare to implement at least one new best-practice related to patient falls in the learner’s facility.
The webinar also offers 1.0 Continuing Education (CE) credit for those who:
- Individually register for the webinar.
- Listen to the live webinar in its entirety. Only those listening live during the session will be eligible to receive credit.
- Complete a post-program evaluation/attestation. The program evaluation/attestation link will be sent to your registered email after the webinar.
Register. The webinar recording and slides will be available approximately two hours after the session.
- Improvement Insights — Preventing Newborn Falls in Hospitals: At Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center (DHMC), researchers sought to reduce newborn falls through a multifaceted intervention. Their efforts are detailed in a new study from the October 2022 issue of The Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety, writes Colleen Whatley, MSN, CPPS, CNS-BC, Senior Quality and Safety Specialist, Quality Assurance and Safety, Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center.
- Dateline @ TJC — Health Equity and Nutrition: White House Strategy Pushes Integration of Nutrition Into Care Delivery: In September 2022, the Biden-Harris administration released its national strategy to combat hunger and promote nutrition and convened a White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health. Recognizing the connection between nutrition, health, and health equity, The Joint Commission has signed on to the Sync for Social Needs coalition, writes Patrick Ross, MPH, Associate Director, Federal Relations.
- Ambulatory Buzz — Ambulatory Health Conference Returning In-person in November: The annual Ambulatory Care Conference (ACC), a two-day event, is scheduled for Nov. 3-4, 2022. The event will be a hybrid, in-person educational program taking place in Rosemont, Illinois, writes Kamaria Patterson, MHA, Education Specialist, Joint Commission Resources.