Our expert answers 3 Questions
I am thinking about how automatically extracted anesthesiology data from dozens of hospitals can be compared to each other. Also, how quality improvement directors and practice leaders can determine the performance of their anesthesiology providers and departments. Lastly, how variation in practice affects perioperative outcomes.
As the effects of anesthetic care on perioperative outcomes becomes clearer, providing a data infrastructure to enable quality improvement across multiple institutions is a fascinating and challenging problem. The quality improvement arm of the Multicenter Perioperative Outcomes Group (MPOG), based at the North Campus Research Complex, is developing tools that allow both academic and community anesthesiology practices to view their performance on a range of quality measures that these practices have themselves determined. Quality improvement directors can view the performance of individual practitioners as well as how the institution compares to other MPOG sites. These individual and site level comparisons are combined with implementation of best practices to improve the quality of care.
The goal is higher quality perioperative care at a lower cost with increased patient satisfaction.