Improving the Delivery of High-Quality Cancer Care in Medically Underserved Communities: A Formative Evaluation Method.

Background And Objectives: In 2015, the American Society of Clinical Oncology launched a new program: Improving Quality of Care in Underserved Communities with the overarching aim of serving patients with cancer who have traditionally had difficulty accessing the care they need. Cancer care requires intense coordination of complex services to provide safe, effective, timely, and equitable care. If chemotherapy and/or radiation is needed, patients must navigate a complex system of care many times, a formidable challenge for many disadvantaged patients.

Factors predicting training transfer in health professionals participating in quality improvement educational interventions.

Background: Predictors of quality improvement (QI) training transfer are needed. This study aimed to identify these predictors among health professionals who participated in a QI training program held at a large hospital in the United States between 2005 and 2014. It also aimed to determine how these predictive factors facilitated or impeded QI training transfer.

ReCAP: Feasibility and Effectiveness of a Pilot Program to Facilitate Quality Improvement Learning in Oncology: Experience of the American Society of Clinical Oncology Quality Training Program.

Purpose: Studies have demonstrated that structured training programs can improve health professionals' skills in performing clinical care or research. We sought to develop and test a novel quality training program (QTP) tailored to oncology clinicians.

Methods: The American Society of Clinical Oncology QTP consisted of three in-person learning sessions and four phases: prework, planning, implementation, and sustain and spread.

Assessing patient care in palliative care using the healthcare matrix.

The healthcare matrix is a novel assessment tool that facilitates systematic examination of patient cases using criteria established by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education and the Institute of Medicine. It is particularly useful for analyzing complex cases, although its use in the palliative care setting has not been documented. We describe here the use of the healthcare matrix to examine the healthcare encounters of a 63 year-old patient with advanced cancer.

Residents Learn to Improve Care Using the ACGME Core Competencies and Institute of Medicine Aims for Improvement: the Health Care Matrix.

Objectives: This article describes how internal medicine residents at Vanderbilt University Medical Center learn to assess and improve care using the Institute of Medicine aims for improvement and the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education core competencies combined in a tool called the health care matrix. The most important and popular use of the health care matrix has been with suboptimal care, in which care is not safe, timely, effective, efficient, equitable, or patient centered.

Background: The core competencies provide a means of defining why care was not safe, timely, effective, efficient, equitable, or patient centered.

The health care matrix formulation: a tool for competency assessment in psychiatry residency training.

Objective: To assert the importance of the use of the healthcare matrix formulation for competency assessment in psychiatry residency training.

Methods: We present a case from our inpatient psychiatric facility and format it in the form of the healthcare matrix, which was developed at Vanderbilt University incorporating the Institute of Medicine 'aims' and the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education 'core competencies'. We also analyze the healthcare matrix and elucidate its use in clinical practice.

Using the healthcare matrix with interns and medical students as a tool to effect change.

The Healthcare Matrix is a tool developed at Vanderbilt University Medical Center which assesses the care of patients using the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) competencies and the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Aims for Improvement. House staff have been using this tool since 2004 as a means of learning the competencies in the daily care of patients. As the residents fill in the cells of the Matrix, the opportunities for improvement become evident.

Medical students learn to assess care using the healthcare matrix.

Background: The Institute of Medicine identified six Aims for Improvement to drive the transformation of healthcare. Simultaneously, the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education issued six competencies as part of the training of residents. American Board of Medical Specialties has also endorsed these competencies for maintenance of certification.

Using a healthcare matrix to assess patient care in terms of aims for improvement and core competencies.

Background: In 2001, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) recommended six Aims f or Improvement; the dimensions of quality describe a health care system that is safe, timely, effective, efficient, equitable, and patient centered. In 1999, the Accreditation Council of Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) adopted six core competencies that physicians in training must master if they are to provide quality care. A Healthcare Matrix was developed that links the IOM aims for improvement and the six ACGME Core Competencies.

Improving glycemic control in adults with diabetes mellitus: shared responsibility in primary care practices.

Background: Primary care physicians provide care for most patients with diabetes mellitus, but few have the resources to achieve the level of glycemic control needed to avert complications

Methods: Primary care physicians referred patients with unsatisfactory glycemic control, frequent hypoglycemia, or inadequate self-management to an endocrinologist-directed team of nurse and dietitian educators for a 3-month program of intensive diabetes care. Patients had at least weekly contact with a diabetes educator and received changes in insulin and/or other medication, coupled with extensive individualized instruction. The main outcome measurement was change in glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c) level at 3 months.