• Current Issue
• ACP Hospitalist Weekly
• Supplements
• Blog
• Archives
  • By Topic
• Career Connection
• Subscribe
• RSS Feeds

Letter from the Editor

From the May ACP Hospitalist, copyright © 2010 by the American College of Physicians

Reducing readmissions is top of mind for many hospitals today, yet efforts have been met with varying degrees of success. Hospitals and physicians in some communities, like Camden, N.J., have taken a comprehensive approach, involving social workers, nurse practitioners and primary care doctors—as well as hospitalists—in efforts to ensure that repeat visitors get access to preventive care. The initiative appears to be working: Hospital admissions of “super utilizers” in Camden have dropped nearly 40% in the last few years. See how it was done in that city, and what other communities are doing along the same lines.

Until recently, a hospitalist interested in quality of care or patient safety research had to cobble together an education by way of webinars and conference sessions. No longer. As our story illustrates, universities across the U.S. are offering master’s degrees in medical quality for those who want to be on the leading edge of this growing field within hospital medicine.

Speaking of quality, our Success Story shows how 16 affiliated hospitals managed to cut urinary tract infection rates by going to the source: catheter use. Ching-Sheng Brian Lin reminds us how important it is to keep a patient’s wishes in mind while delivering the safest, highest-quality care possible. And U.S. doctors in Haiti are turning their eyes toward quality issues on a larger scale, as well, now that health care post-earthquake has moved from triage to more long-term, systemic concerns. Read about their work.

Has your hospital had success in reducing admissions, or in improving a quality measure? Tell us about it.

Sincerely,

Jessica Berthold

Editor, ACP Hospitalist

Top

Share

 

Hospitalist Archives
Quick Links

ACP Hospitalist Weekly

From the February 1, 2012 edition

• Hospitalist practice models have little effect on job satisfaction, burnout, survey finds
• Hospital stays involving C. diff leveled off between 2008 and 2009

View issue

Cartoon Caption Contest

ACP HospitalistWeekly wants readers to create captions for this cartoon and help choose the winner. Pen the winning caption and win a $50 gift certificate good toward any ACP product, program or service.

• Name
• Email
• Caption No HTML tags permitted.

Prepare with the Experts: Live Recert Prep Courses from ACP

ACP Launches Depression Care Guide

© ACP Hospitalist and American College of Physicians

ACP Hospitalist provides news and information for internists about the practice of medicine and reports on the policies, products and activities of ACP. All published material, which is covered by copyright, represents the views of the contributor and does not reflect the opinion of the American College of Physicians or any other institution unless clearly stated