Inside the health disparities collaboratives: a detailed exploration of quality improvement at community health centers.

Background: Quality improvement collaboratives (QICs) based on the Chronic Care Model (CCM) are widely used models for improving medical care, but there has been little information to date about the specific projects undertaken by participants in these collaboratives and their outcomes.

Objectives: To describe initiatives undertaken by community health centers (CHCs) participating in QICs (the Health Disparities Collaboratives) for asthma, cardiovascular disease, or diabetes, and to determine whether particular features of these initiatives were associated with improvement in health care processes or outcomes.

Research Design: Observational cohort study.

Validation of the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 for depression screening among Chinese Americans.

Objective: The objective of this study was to validate the Chinese Bilingual version of the Patient Health Questionnaire (CB-PHQ-9) for screening for depression among Chinese Americans in primary care.

Method: Chinese-American patients attending a primary care clinic were screened for major depressive disorder (MDD) using the CB-PHQ-9. All patients who scored 15 or higher on the CB-PHQ-9 were interviewed using the Chinese-bilingual Structured Clinical Interview for the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, patient version.