Our approach to health is undergoing a transformation, with profound implications for the role of the patient, the practice and business of medicine, and for many of the efforts we’ve come to think of as patient safety projects. The impulses feeding this transformation come largely from the public—consumers, politicians, government agencies, nonprofit organizations—not so much from providers and traditional medical institutions. This transformation is consistent with a broad-based consumerism movement, driven in part by access to information and technology.

Frontier Medicine Better Health Partnership (FMBHP) and Vree Health – a wholly owned subsidiary of Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp. focused on technology-enabled services designed to improve the reach, cost-efficiency and effectiveness of healthcare – has announced a collaboration designed to improve care transitions and reduce hospital readmission rates for patients in rural areas.

A new not-for-profit, statewide organization aimed at strengthening hospital-based patient safety and quality improvement activities has been launched by the California Hospital Association (CHA) and the three affiliated Regional Associations.

The Pharmacy Quality Alliance (PQA) and CECity.com, Inc. (CECity) have launched Pharmacy Quality Solutions, Inc. (PQS), a joint venture created to deliver EQuIPPTM (Electronic Quality Improvement Platform for Plans and Pharmacies), the first national pharmacy quality measurement, benchmarking, and reporting platform for pharmacies and health plans.

By Nalin Jain and Robin Keeney

Despite spending more on healthcare than any nation, the U.S. health system ranks last or next to last on high performance dimensions when compared to health systems of six other developed nations — Australia, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand and the United Kingdom (Davis et al., 2010).

Community Health Systems (NYSE: CYH) and Cleveland Clinic have formed a strategic alliance to enhance the quality of patient care, improve access to healthcare services, reduce costs and drive operational excellence.

Arcadia Solutions, a leading provider of data-driven quality improvement solutions, along with the Cardiac Intensive Care Unit (CICU) and Medical/Surgical Intensive Care Unit (MSICU) at Boston Children’s Hospital, has announced the next version of its T3 platform.

Seventeen leading medical specialty societies have identified specific tests, procedures or medication therapies they say are commonly ordered, but which are not always necessary—and could cause undue harm. To date, more than 130 tests and procedures to question have been released as part of the ABIM Foundation’s Choosing Wisely® campaign, which aims to spark conversations between patients and physicians about what care is really necessary.