Inaugural TJC Physician Leader Forum Held in June
Physicians from throughout the country were invited to participate in the inaugural Physician Leader Forum sponsored by The Joint Commission (TJC). Capella Healthcare was one of 42 organizations invited, represented by Dr. Erik Swensson, Chief Medical Officer.
The President and CEO of TJC Mark Chassin, MD, FACP, MPP, MPH, who is a board-certified internist and worked for 12 years in the ED, spoke about transforming healthcare. He has refocused TJC in its work with the 20,000 healthcare organizations it accredits and certifies to improve their safety and quality.
“I think it is a credit to The Joint Commission that there is a physician in charge and that he is actively moving TJC in a new direction,” said Dr. Swensson. “Of course, TJC is still tasked with hospital surveys and accreditation responsibilities and still works closely with CMS and their Conditions of Participation (CoP), but their new focus is on the patient. Just as medicine is grappling with the shift from being physician-centric to patient-centric, TJC understands that if its sole purpose is one of ‘surveyor and enforcer,’ it will have a limited effect on improving patient outcomes.”
The TJC’s new mission – “We are an improvement organization, creating and delivering quality solutions.” – was established under Dr. Chassin’s leadership by forming The Joint Commission Center for Transforming Healthcare in 2009. Achievement of the mission revolves around evaluation, collaborative surveys, recognizing opportunities for facility improvements in patient care and then as necessary, directing the facility to educational resources. The Joint Commission also understands that hospitals and other healthcare facilities need to be highly reliable. They have begun to identify traits found in high reliable organizations (HRO) so that they may be used to guide others.
“As physicians, we need to become educated in this field of science so that we can help lead our hospitals in becoming HROs,” Dr. Swenson said. “The basic traits are a robust process improvement, a fully functional safety culture and effective leadership at both the clinical and administrative level.”
The keynote speaker of the conference was Dr. Michael Shabot, MD, FACS, FCCM, FACMI, who is CMO for Memorial Hermann Healthcare System in Houston. This system includes 12 large hospitals, 18 ASCs and 120 other ambulatory facilities. They have over 3,500 physicians, the vast majority in private practice. He has been instrumental in moving MHHS to a zero occurrence in many hospital-acquired conditions (HAC), for which his system has received many national quality awards. He spoke about integrating quality and safety strategies, while candidly sharing about many of the roadblocks placed in his way by physicians and administrators. Dr. Shabot co-authored the book “Integrating Quality and Strategy in Health Care Organizations.”
“During my day at the Physician Leader Forum there was a very active open dialogue about the resistance to this transformation, and tactics to be used in order to assist our hospitals in becoming highly reliable organizations,” Dr. Swensson said. “It was apparent that we all have a long way to go, but both The Joint Commission staff and the physician leaders in the room were fully committed to this result. I recommend physicians check out The Joint Commission’s website for useful information regarding process improvements.”