Accredited hospitals in America have steadily improved the quality of patient care over a seven-year period, saving lives and improving the health of thousands of patients, according to the Joint Commission’s latest annual report.
The report, “Improving America’s Hospitals: The Joint Commission’s Report on Quality and Safety 2009,” provides scientific evidence of improvements in the care of patients with heart attacks, heart failure, pneumonia and surgical conditions. Since their inception as core measures in 2002, pneumococcal vaccination and smoking cessation advice measures have demonstrated the greatest rates of improvement. Children’s asthma care also was measured and included in the report for the first time.
“In addition to saving lives and improving health, improved quality reduces health care costs by eliminating preventable complications,” says Mark R. Chassin, MD, MPP, MPH, president of the Joint Commission. “Quality improvement is an important aspect of the ongoing reform effort to make healthcare accessible to more Americans and ‘bend the curve’ on increasing costs. By eliminating the preventable complications that today drive up the cost of care, we would easily save the many billions of dollars lawmakers are struggling so hard to locate.”
The fourth annual report shows continual improvement between 2002 and 2008 on 12 quality measures reflecting the best evidence-based treatments for heart attack, heart failure and pneumonia – practices demonstrated by scientific evidence to lead to the best outcomes. The magnitude of national improvement on these measures ranged from 4.9 percent to 58.8 percent. Hospital performance also improved on 13 other measures.
