Beneath, Beyond Burnout: Solving for Causes.

This article offers a different perspective of the current crisis in health care-burnout that is causing medical errors, disengagement, and economic chaos and forcing talented, experienced health care professionals to leave their institutions or their chosen professions altogether. The lack of meaningful impact lies in the focus on treating problems observed rather than on system issues underlying the more overt symptoms of burnout and attrition. The system within which health care workers perform impacts their capacity to consistently deliver high-quality care. Existing systems and structures often yield undesirable results, and harm individual workers. The authors explore strategies that focus on understanding and responding to the causes impacting staff and organizational performance. Lack of application of continually evolving evidence from numerous intersecting fields of neuroscience leads to the design of work systems that cause trauma and moral injury or that exacerbate original early life trauma, reducing the capability to operate successfully in the complex environments in which we work and live. It also leads to incomplete, insufficient, and, at times, outmoded systems of support for the well-being of all within the system. Too often, burnout results. In contrast to problem-solving, cause-solving requires holistic approaches to understanding interactions of system components. The authors will put forth a road map for creating components of a healing ecosystem that support trauma-informed and system-wide transformation. Recognition leads to commitment to systemic transformation toward a more healing system for all. Long-term, system performance cannot be sustained, nor organizational needs met, when people in the system are distressed.

Perspectives of Patients, Clinicians, and Health System Leaders on Changes Needed to Improve the Health Care and Outcomes of Older Adults With Multiple Chronic Conditions.

OBJECTIVE: To ascertain perspectives of multiple stakeholders on contributors to inappropriate care for older adults with multiple chronic conditions. METHOD: Perspectives of 36 purposively sampled patients, clinicians, health systems, and payers were elicited. Data analysis followed a constant comparative method. RESULTS: Structural factors triggering burden and fragmentation include disease-based quality metrics and need to interact with multiple clinicians. The key cultural barrier identified is the assumption that "physicians know best." Inappropriate decision making may result from inattention to trade-offs and adherence to multiple disease guidelines. Stakeholders recommended changes in culture, structure, and decision making. Care options and quality metrics should reflect a focus on patients' priorities. Clinician-patient partnerships should reflect patients knowing their health goals and clinicians knowing how to achieve them. Access to specialty expertise should not require visits. DISCUSSION: Stakeholders' recommendations suggest health care redesigns that incorporate patients' health priorities into care decisions and realign relationships across patients and clinicians.

Translation of obesity practice guidelines: interprofessional perspectives regarding the impact of public health nurse system-level intervention.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of the study was to investigate the perceptions of administrators and clinicians regarding a public health facilitated collaborative supporting the translation into practice of the Institute for Clinical Systems Improvement (ICSI) Adult Obesity Guideline. DESIGN AND SAMPLE: This qualitative study was conducted with 10 health care organizations participating in a voluntary, interprofessional obesity management collaborative. A purposive sample of 39 participants included two to three clinicians and an administrator from each organization. Interview analysis focused on how the intervention affected participants and their practices. RESULTS: Four themes described participant experiences of obesity guideline translation: (1) a shift from powerlessness to positive motivation, (2) heightened awareness coupled with improved capacity to respond, (3) personal ownership and use of creativity, and (4) a sense of the importance of increased interprofessional collaboration. CONCLUSIONS: The investigation of interprofessional perspectives illuminates the feelings and perceptions of clinician and administrator participants regarding obesity practice guideline translation. These themes suggest that positive motivation, improved capacity, personal creative ownership, and interprofessional collaboration may be conducive to successful evidence-based obesity guideline implementation. Further research is needed to evaluate these findings relative to translating the ICSI obesity guideline and other guidelines into practice in diverse clinical settings.

Translation of obesity practice guidelines: measurement and evaluation.

OBJECTIVE(S): A public health nurse (PHN) in the Midwestern United States (U.S.) led a collaborative system-level intervention to translate the Institute of Clinical Systems Improvement (ICSI) Adult Obesity Guideline into interprofessional practice. This study (1) evaluated the extent of guideline translation across organizations and (2) assessed the Omaha System as a method for translating system-level interventions and measuring outcomes. DESIGN AND SAMPLE: This retrospective, mixed methods study was conducted with a purposeful sample of one administrator (n = 10) and two to three clinicians (n = 29) from each organization (n = 10). MEASURES: Omaha System Problem Rating Scale for Outcomes Knowledge, Behavior, and Status (KBS). KBS ratings gathered from semi-structured interviews and Omaha System documentation were analyzed using standard descriptive and inferential statistics and triangulated findings with participant quotes. RESULTS: KBS ratings and participant quotes revealed intervention effectiveness in creating sustained system-level changes. Self-reported and observed KBS ratings demonstrated improvement across organizations. There was moderate to substantial agreement regarding benchmark attainment within organizations. On average, self-reported improvement exceeded observer improvement. CONCLUSIONS: System-level PHN practice facilitator interventions successfully translated clinical obesity guidelines into interprofessional use in health care organizations. The Omaha System Problem Rating Scale for Outcomes reliably measured system-level outcomes.

Feasibility of encoding the Institute for Clinical Systems Improvement Depression Guideline using the Omaha System.

Evidence-based clinical guidelines are being developed to bridge the gap between research and practice with the goals of improving health care quality and population health. However, disseminating, implementing, and ensuring ongoing use of clinical guidelines in practice settings is challenging. The purpose of this study was to demonstrate the feasibility of encoding evidence-based clinical guidelines using the Omaha System. Clinical documentation with Omaha System-encoded guidelines generates individualized, meaningful data suitable for program evaluation and health care quality research. The use of encoded guidelines within the electronic health record has potential to reinforce use of guidelines, and thus improve health care quality and population health. Research using Omaha System data generated by clinicians has potential to discover new knowledge related to guideline use and effectiveness.

Prevalence of practice system tools for improving depression care among primary care clinics: the DIAMOND initiative.

BACKGROUND: Practice system tools improve chronic disease care, but are generally lacking for the care of depression in most primary care settings. OBJECTIVE: To describe the frequency of various depression-related practice system tools among Minnesota primary care clinics interested in improving depression care. DESIGN: Cross-sectional survey. PARTICIPANTS: Physician leaders of 82 clinics in Minnesota. MAIN MEASURES: A survey including practice systems recommended for care of depression and chronic conditions, each scored on a 100-point scale, and the clinic's priority for improving depression care on a 10-point scale. KEY RESULTS: Fewer practice systems tools were present and functioning well for depression care (score = 24.4 [SD 1.6]) than for the care of chronic conditions in general (score = 43.9 [SD 1.6]), p < 0.001. The average priority for improving depression care was 5.8 (SD 2.3). There was not a significant correlation between the presence of practice systems for depression or chronic disease care and the priority for depression care except for a modest correlation with the depression Decision Support subscale (r = 0.29, p = 0.008). Certain staffing patterns, a metropolitan-area clinic location, and the presence of a fully functional electronic medical record were associated with the presence of more practice system tools. CONCLUSIONS: Few practice system tools are in place for improving depression care in Minnesota primary care clinics, and these are less well-developed than general chronic disease practice systems. Future research should focus on demonstrating whether implementing these tools for depression care results in much-needed improvements in care for patients with depression.

The future of personal health records: a summary of a roundtable discussion.

In 2009, the Institute for Clinical Systems Improvement held a roundtable on personal health records (PHRs). Participants shared their thoughts about which features and functions are desired in a PHR, areas that need further exploration, and ways PHRs could make health care more efficient and effective. This article summarizes those discussions.

Partnership research: a practical trial design for evaluation of a natural experiment to improve depression care.

BACKGROUND: Translational research is increasingly important as academic health centers transform themselves to meet new requirements of National Institutes of Health funding. Most attention has focused on T1 translation studies (bench to bedside) with considerable uncertainty about how to enhance T2 (effectiveness trials) and especially T3 (implementation studies). OBJECTIVE: To describe an innovative example of a T3 study, conducted as partnership research with the leaders of a major natural experiment in Minnesota to improve the primary care of depression. METHODS: All health plans in the state have agreed on a new payment model to support clinics that implement the well-evidenced collaborative care model for depression in the Depression Improvement Across Minnesota: Offering a New Direction initiative. The Depression Improvement Across Minnesota: Offering a New Direction study was developed in an ongoing partnership with the Initiative leaders from 7 health plans, 85 clinics, and a regional quality improvement collaborative to evaluate the implementation and its impacts on patients and other stakeholders. We agreed on a staggered implementation, multiple baseline research design, using the concepts of practical clinical trials and engaged scholarship and have collaborated on all aspects of conducting the study, including joint identification of patient and clinic survey recipients. RESULTS: Complex study methods have worked well through 20 months because of the commitment of all stakeholders to both the Initiative and the Study. Over 1500 subjects have been recruited from health plan information delivered weekly, and 99.7% of 316 physicians and administrators from all participating clinical organizations have completed the Study surveys. CONCLUSIONS: Partnership research can greatly facilitate translational research studies.

Evaluating the use of a modified CAHPS survey to support improvements in patient-centred care: lessons from a quality improvement collaborative.

OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the use of a modified Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) survey to support quality improvement in a collaborative focused on patient-centred care, assess subsequent changes in patient experiences, and identify factors that promoted or impeded data use. BACKGROUND: Healthcare systems are increasingly using surveys to assess patients' experiences of care but little is established about how to use these data in quality improvement. DESIGN: Process evaluation of a quality improvement collaborative. SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: The CAHPS team from Harvard Medical School and the Institute for Clinical Systems Improvement organized a learning collaborative including eight medical groups in Minnesota. INTERVENTION: Samples of patients recently visiting each group completed a modified CAHPS survey before, after and continuously over a 12-month project. Teams were encouraged to set goals for improvement using baseline data and supported as they made interventions with bi-monthly collaborative meetings, an online tool reporting the monthly data, a resource manual called The CAHPS Improvement Guide, and conference calls. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Changes in patient experiences. Interviews with team leaders assessed the usefulness of the collaborative resources, lessons and barriers to using data. RESULTS: Seven teams set goals and six made interventions. Small improvements in patient experience were observed in some groups, but in others changes were mixed and not consistently related to the team actions. Two successful groups appeared to have strong quality improvement structures and had focussed on relatively simple interventions. Team leaders reported that frequent survey reports were a powerful stimulus to improvement, but that they needed more time and support to engage staff and clinicians in changing their behaviour. CONCLUSIONS: Small measurable improvements in patient experience may be achieved over short projects. Sustaining more substantial change is likely to require organizational strategies, engaged leadership, cultural change, regular measurement and performance feedback and experience of interpreting and using survey data.