How is the Remaking American Medicine Campaign helping to achieve this goal?
What is Patient- and Family- Centered Care?
- What are the core concepts of patient- and family-centered care?
- Recent Statistics Related to Quality of Health Care in America
- How is the Remaking American Medicine Campaign helping to achieve this goal?
- Condition H (Condition Help)
- What Patients expect from the Health Care System
- Top Ten Quality Indicators of an Effective Patient- and Family-Centered Physician
- Top Ten Things a Patient or Family Member can do to Ensure Quality Care
- Patients And Families As Advisors: A Checklist For Attitudes
- Patients And Families As Partners: A Checklist For Attitudes
The goal of Remaking American Medicine (RAM) and the national outreach campaign is to stimulate a dialogue about quality improvement and to issue a call to action. It is intended to help empower patients to become advocates for better care and to motivate, inspire and connect individuals, organization and institutions.
A national public outreach campaign is underway to help spread the word about the pioneering work being accomplished in improving health care. As of July 2006, 48 national organizations have signed on as National Partners, including health care providers, purchasers, consumers and patient advocates, health care experts and government and regulatory groups. These organizations are alerting their members and encouraging them to participate in community-based activities designed to draw public attention to improving the quality of health care.
In order to accomplish these objectives, the campaign encourages the creation of local RAM coalitions representing purchasers, providers, policy makers, regulators, public broadcasting, consumer advocates, the business community, patients and their families. In many regions of the country, such efforts are being led by the nation's Quality Improvement Organizations (QIOs) that are forming coalitions comprised of other groups that are equally committed to improving health care. Collectively, National Partners can reach more than 100 million Americans with information about improving health care quality.Working closely with their health care colleagues and reaching out to PBS stations, Quality Improvement Organizations view their participation in Remaking American Medicine as an opportunity to advance their own ongoing missions to improve health care quality.
Operating under specific contracts from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), QIOs work with consumers, physicians, hospitals, and other caregivers to refine care delivery systems to make sure Medicare beneficiaries receive quality care. This may include nursing home and home health care providers, as well as hospitals and physicians' offices. QIOs are also dedicated to finding methods that reduce disparities in treatment for Medicare recipients from underserved populations or living in rural communities. Every state and US territory or possession is served by a QIO. They have been working for more than two decades with CMS to ensure quality health care for beneficiaries.
Many QIOs are spearheading the development of local/regional coalitions in their communities. Working closely with their health care colleagues and reaching out to PBS stations, QIOs view their participation in Remaking American Medicine as an opportunity to advance their own ongoing missions to improve health care quality. You can use the Connect with Others searchable database to identify if your state's QIO is developing a local coalition. Today, 30 RAM coalitions are actively engaged in a variety of local outreach activities. These coalitions selected a particular quality issue, set goals, established alliances, pooled resources and are taking positive action — community by community.
