Quality
As a patient, you play a key role in the quality and safety of your own health care. The more educated you are about quality health care, the better decisions you can make for you and your family.
Adventist Health Central Valley Network believes that measuring quality in health care should involve examining many areas in the delivery of care. Our leadership and medical staff regularly review our quality outcome measures, the use of evidence-based clinical guidelines, the number of patients who have been treated with complex diagnoses and procedures, our safety track record and the patient's experience.
Our Quality Improvement Initiatives
Best Practice Core Measures
Adventist Health Central Valley Network has been focused on a nationwide effort to ensure that patients coming into the medical center with specific conditions receive recommended "best" care. These recommendations are based on years of research on interventions that have been proven to improve outcomes for the conditions of heart attacks, pneumonia, heart failure and surgeries.
Culture of Safety Initiatives
Since 2008, Adventist Health Central Valley Network has teamed up with Dr. Bryan Sexton, PhD, from Duke University Health system on a groundbreaking quality initiative on teamwork and safety improvement processes. The project uses a survey tool called the Safety Attitudes Questionnaire which is filled out by hospital staff who identify specific issues and areas of concern regarding teamwork and patient safety. Dr. Sexton reviews survey results and provides recommendations on how to address improvement. The Safety Attitudes Questionnaire has been used in medical, aviation, maritime, rail and military settings, as well as in more than 1,800 hospitals in the US, UK, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Turkey and New Zealand.
Emergency Department Collaborative Initiative
Adventist Health Central Valley Network is currently participating in a Emergency Department Collaborative. The goal of the project is to have superior Emergency Departments (EDs) with exceptional results in patient throughput, quality and service. More specifically, the collaborative focuses on patient flow (such as wait times, admission processes, etc.), patient satisfaction and the quality of patient care.
Pressure Ulcer Campaign
Adventist Health Central Valley Network is involved in a system-wide collaborative to reduce the occurrence of pressure ulcers (pressure sores). According to the Agency of Healthcare Research and Quality, the incidence of pressure ulcers among hospital patients increased steadily between 1993 and 2006. The goal of the campaign is to facilitate an interdisciplinary approach to maintaining skin integrity and managing skin breakdown and improve outcomes in this area. To date, significant progress toward identifying best practices to reduce hospital-acquired pressure ulcers has been made. We'll continue focus on this until there are zero!
Hand Hygiene Campaign
What if 15 seconds could save a life? It can.
Adventist Health Central Valley Network's Hand Hygiene Campaign aims to increase awareness among staff, physicians, visitors and patients regarding the importance of hand-washing and the use of alcohol-based sanitizers in preventing the spread of infections. As part of this campaign, the hospital has displayed campaign posters throughout the facility and laminated cards at hand washing sinks to remind employees and others interacting with patients to frequently clean their hands. As a result of the campaign, the hospital has seen infection rates that are at or below current benchmarks
Patient Satisfaction
Improving the patient experience is integral to our commitment to being patient-centered. We use a national standard tool, the Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems Hospital Survey component (HCAHPS), to measure patient experience and identify areas where we need to improve. Through the years, our network has rigorously evaluated its overall delivery of care from the patient's perspective using a measurement approach developed by National Research Corporation (NRC), a premier research organization for the health care industry.
Our Awards, Recognitions and Certifications
We have received numerous awards, recognitions and certifications for our quality and safety standards.
Our Publicly Reported Measures
Many organizations today (some governmental, some private) are measuring quality in health care using different measurements. Here are some examples: