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RIPA moves forward on community collaboration efforts March 03, 2009 Last fall, RIPA president, Dr. Mary Labanowski, published a letter to our members and the community explaining that RIPA was dedicating its resources and efforts to the formation of a community collaborative focused on quality improvement. In the changing insurance landscape, RIPA's ability to carry out its mission of building a more effective and efficient health care delivery system in a way that creates mutually beneficial relationships for practitioners and clients could no longer be served by contracting as a capitated physician organization. During a board retreat last spring, it was determined that to accomplish our mission we would need to broaden our working relationships in order to reach our goals. We found that our experience was far from unique nationally and that we were in fact reaching the same conclusion that many other prominent and progressive communities had come to in forming regional healthcare collaboratives . Even within our community other organizations have realized this imperative if we expect to truly impact the health of our population. There has been a lot of activity in the past few months and we are very pleased with the progress being made toward actuating a multi-stakeholder community quality improvement collaborative. We have developed a strategic partnership with the Finger Lakes Health Systems Agency (FLHSA) that will leverage the combination of our skills and resources. This will enable us to bring together essential components to integrate community health planning and develop measurement strategies that can be used to drive quality improvement. A central focus is to create a forum for all stakeholders to work together in an environment that respects the needs of all and focuses on the collaborative pursuit of mutually agreed upon goals. This is the conscious rejection of focusing on identifying who to blame for problems that do exist, with a shift to finding ways in which all stakeholders can accept responsibility for their role in changing the system to overcome the failings we are currently experiencing. We are focusing on two projects that will work hand-in-hand. One is the community's application for inclusion in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Grant:Aligning Forces for Quality. "The premise of Aligning Forces is that no single person, group or profession can improve health and health care throughout a community without support of others. AF4Q asks these critical stakeholders to work toward common, fundamental objectives that RWJF and others believe will lead to better care."FLHSA and RIPA have submitted the community's application and have received notification that the Rochester effort has been chosen as a semifinalist for this grant. We are now working on other details to continue this effort. A site visit that was attended by a broad group of community stakeholders was conducted on February 20.The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation anticipates selecting communities to participate in the next round of planning for AF4Q in mid-March. Check back at www.ripa.org periodically for updates. The other project is working with the FLHSA in follow-up of the Community Health System 2020 Commission. This historic blending of Certificate of Need Application with a multi-stakeholder evaluation of the community's needs has led to a recommendation that we collectively address the conditions that are leading to suboptimal care that drives inappropriate and unnecessary use of both ED and hospital capacity. This brings the recognition that we need to reject the silo approach where each healthcare entity is expected to solve problems that are better addressed systemically. As part of the recommendations of that commission, there will be an oversight group assembled to bring together all the players necessary to collectively analyze and address the multiple factors necessary to solve the problems identified. As the CEO of RIPA I hasten to point out that while we are playing an important role in promoting a community collaborative, RIPA as an organization is committed to bring providers together to discuss clinical issues, advocate for their needs and interests and serve as a voice in the community for our members. What is very different as we move into the next phase of our development is that to be effective we cannot act in isolation. We need to work collaboratively with consumers (our patients), other physician organizations, hospital systems, the business community, other healthcare providers (such as nursing), and insurers in order to reach the collective goal of improving the health and healthcare in our communities. Listed below are the local organizations participating in the AF4Q effort with links to their websites as well as links to national quality improvement efforts. National Quality Improvement Efforts, Stand For Quality Health Care Planning Finger Lakes Health Systems Agency Physicians/Practitioners Rochester Individual Practice Association Monroe County Medical Society Rochester Community Individual Practice Association Insurers/Health Plans Excellus BlueCross Blue Shield Preferred Care/MVP Public Health Monroe County Department of Public Health Safety Net Providers Monroe Plan for Medical Care Rochester Primary Care Network Hospital Systems Rochester General Hospital Unity Health System University of Rochester Medical Center Business Community Rochester Business Alliance Paychex Wegmans Community Organizations Action for a Better Community National Kidney Foundation United Way of Greater Rochester Nursing University of Rochester School of Nursing Nurse Practitioner Association, Greater Rochester Chapter Genesee Valley Nurses Association Consumer/Practitioner Information Organizations Rochester Health Greater Rochester Regional Health Information Organization Center to Improve Communication in Healthcare  An Open Letter to the Rochester Health Care Community September 04, 2008 In 2001, the Institute of Medicine released "Crossing the Quality Chasm" as a challenge to the United States' health care system to transform delivery systems to ensure that patients safely receive the care they need at the right place, when they need it. While national coordination of quality measures and standards of care are essential to that transformation, it is becoming increasingly clear that action at the local and regional level holds the greatest promise to realize true changes to care. Our health care community holds great responsibility in leading that change. Over the years, our regional hospital systems and insurers have developed active, successful quality improvement programs. But meaningful change must involve the physician community in a more central role. One important component of a quality improvement initiative is a community or region-wide feedback system that lets health care practitioners objectively know how they are doing relative to published, clinically accepted national standards as well as their community peers. Providing accurate, meaningful data about underuse and overuse of services in our community, regardless of a patient's insurance status, would allow practitioners to consider and develop the practice design needed to ensure the highest quality of care. With that responsibility in mind, the Rochester Individual Practice Association Board of Directors, at its May 31, 2008 planning retreat, voted to capitalize on our prior experience and move forward as a leader in creating a community wide healthcare quality improvement program. This collaborative would seek to pool data from payer and provider sources, and develop feedback tools across payers and health systems allowing practitioners access to a single source of information across their entire patient population. We have repeatedly heard frustration from our members that scorecards and reports from multiple sources on sub-segments of patient populations do little to identify consistent, actionable information that can help with quality improvement. Several regional quality improvement collaboratives are already operating effectively throughout the country including Massachusetts Health Quality Partners "a broad-based coalition of physicians, hospitals, health plans, purchasers, consumers, and government agencies working together to promote improvement in the quality of health care services in Massachusetts." MHQP was first established in 1995 by a group of Massachusetts health care leaders who identified the importance of valid, comparable measures to drive improvement. The Pittsburgh Regional Health Initiative "was the first regional consortium of medical, business and civic leaders to address healthcare safety and quality improvement as a social and business imperative. Turning its own community into a demonstration lab, PRHI strives to accelerate improvement and set the pace for the nation." Links to additional collaborative websites are provided below. Regional quality improvement has also been the subject of some excellent publications. The California Healthcare Foundation published "It Takes a Region: Creating a Framework to Improve Chronic Disease Care" in 2006. And the Commonwealth Fund published "Physician Organization in Relation to Quality and Efficiency of Care: A Synthesis of Recent Literature" in April 2008. Each of these papers provides excellent and thorough background on the vital components for success of community-wide quality improvement collaboratives. These can help the Rochester/Finger Lakes region develop a "roadmap" as we come together and build momentum to develop this collaborative effort. You are encouraged to visit these websites to download these articles. In addition, we have developed a list of "Frequently Asked Questions." We will periodically update this information so please check back. The RIPA Board of Directors and its many specialty advisory committees have a long history of developing innovative approaches to sharing meaningful, clinically relevant feedback with practitioners. We are excited to provide the impetus that we hope will lead to development of a valuable and ongoing resource that can help to continuously improve our healthcare system. Rochester RHIO launches in nine-county Greater Rochester area July 03, 2008 Rochester RHIO, our community's regional health information organization, is up and running with an extended pilot. The original participants - 26 physicians from five different practices - are continuing to test the RHIO's full "virtual health record" (VHR) capability, viewing insurance eligibility, test results, medication history and other patient information electronically. The VHR pilot is also being expanded to additional specialist practices, nursing homes, and home healthcare settings. Many more physicians are using the exchange today to receive electronic test results and for e-prescribing. Any physician with a computer and internet access can receive lab results electronically, within a week of signing up for the exchange. Organizations providing data to the RHIO exchange today include ACM Medical Laboratories, Elizabeth Wende Breast Clinic, Excellus BlueCross BlueShield, Preferred Care, Unity Health System and University of Rochester Medical Center. Many others will be added in the coming months, including Clifton Springs Hospital, Lakeside Hospital, Nicholas H. Noyes Memorial Hospital, Thompson Health, United Memorial Medical Center, and ViaHealth. The state health department recently gave Rochester RHIO two of the largest grants in the state to expand services, under the Health Efficiency and Affordability Law of New York. •$6.7 million will help 75 independent practices to purchase EMR hardware and software, with implementation support from Monroe County Medical Society. Physicians interested in EMR adoption through the MCMS EMR Service Bureau may contact Nancy Adams at 585-473-4072. •$6.1 million to improve continuity of care by expanding RHIO access to EMS providers, emergency departments, and long term care facilities. RHIO will also use this grant to provide direct links to Medicaid patient information, and to develop a portal that will allow patients to view their records online. Deployment will continue and a public advertising campaign are expected to begin in the fall. Rochester RHIO will provide all participating offices materials to educate office staff and support their efforts to manage the patient consent process. Specific information regarding costs, technology, the consent process, security and more can be found at http://www.grrhio.org/pat_providers.shtml. Physicians interested in joining Rochester RHIO may call Jessica Hasler at 877-865-RHIO (7446). For more information, visit www.grrhio.org Community Guidelines Available for Download December 20, 2007 Community practice guidelines can now be viewed and downloaded at the Monroe County Medical Society website. Guidelines were developed as part of the Rochester Community-Wide Clinical Guidelines Initiative, an initiative currently facilitated by the Monroe County Medical Society with representation from Aetna, Excellus BlueCross BlueShield, GRIPA, Kodak, The Monroe County Health Department, The Monroe County Medical Society, The Monroe Plan for Medical Care, Preferred Care, RIPA, Thompsonhealth, University of Rochester Medical Center/Strong Health, Unity Health System and ViaHealth. To view and download the guidelines, visit the Medical Society's website guidelines area at http://cwcg.mcms.org |
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RIPA Rochester Individual Practice Association, Inc. | P: (585) 242-0610 | F: (585) 242-0682 | Directions/Map
Copyright © 2004 by Rochester Individual Practice Association, Inc. All rights reserved. Website designed and built by LogicalSolutions.net
Copyright © 2004 by Rochester Individual Practice Association, Inc. All rights reserved. Website designed and built by LogicalSolutions.net