Becker's Clinical Quality & Infection Control

16 QUALITY IMPROVEMENT & MEASUREMENT 'TeamBirth' method has streamlined 115 births at Virginia Mason since rollout By Ashleigh Hollowell S eattle-based Virginia Mason Medical Center launched a new model of labor and delivery care, one that has rolled out at a handful of hospitals nationwide — including at 15 hospitals in Washington state — and has since streamlined processes for 115 new births since its implementation in October. Two Virginia Mason hospitals were part of the initial 15 hospitals selected by the Washington State Hospital Association to begin using the new labor and delivery care method. "We've gotten very positive feedback. Patients are grateful for everyone to be on the same page – especially those who transfer from other hospitals who don't have TeamBirth in place; they are surprised at how much autonomy they have over their birthing process here," Allie Pleas, BSN, RN, a labor and delivery nurse for Virginia Mason Franciscan Health stated in the Feb. 1 news release. "is protocol has allowed us to honor their original plan with minimal intervention, and we've been able to integrate what the patient wants with the VMMC plan." Developed in 2021 by Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Ariadne Labs and UMass Memorial Health, the TeamBirth model prioritizes routine check-ins with all members of a patient's care team and family at key points to streamline communication about birth preferences and patient status using a whiteboard as a key tool. Fourteen additional hospitals have signed up to be part of the second and third cohorts that will implement the model with the help of the Washington State Hospital Association. n Collaborative care in hospitals tied to stronger outcomes By Erica Carbajal A new study based on data from more than 7,000 patients found collaborative care models in hospitals are tied to shorter hospital stays and other improved outcomes. Researchers say it is the first study to analyze the benefits of a collaborative care model — which includes a team of providers, case managers, social workers, specialists and other clinical staff — in a hospital setting. "The whole idea when you talk about collaborative care teams is that it's an extra coordination effort for hospitals," Douglas Morrice, PhD, professor in the department of information, risk and operations management at the University of Texas at Austin's McCombs School of Business, said in a news release sent to Becker's. "Is the effort worth it? Our conclusion is that it is well worth it." To conduct the study, Dr. Morrice and colleagues analyzed data from patients at University Hospital who were discharged between June 2014 and October 2016. Collaborative care was rolled out in the middle of this period, allowing the research team to look at its debut and estimate its effect on length of stay, readmission rates and discharge time of day. Collaborative care teams were associated with a 9% decrease in expected length of stay. They also found a 27% increase in the likelihood that a patient would be discharged before 2 p.m., optimizing patient throughput. Surveys were also part of the research and found patients who were cared for by a collaborative care team reported high satisfaction. n How Mayo Clinic cut unnecessary antibiotic prescribing by half By Ashleigh Hollowell R ochester, Minn.-based Mayo Clinic has reduced the number of unnecessary antibiotic prescriptions by half by implementing an outpatient antibiotic stewardship program. In a review of the initiative's rollout, which began in 2020 across facilities in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Florida, and Arizona, the intervention was found to decrease overprescribing of antibiotics from 21.7% to 11.2%. Prescribing antibiotics unnecessarily exacerbates antimicrobial resistance, a concern shared by nearly 90% of hospital executives. Mayo Clinic's outpatient antibiotic stewardship program focuses on provider education, development of a syndrome-based, pre-populated ambulatory panel and peer reporting. The health system also utilizes a provider-facing data dashboard to create transparency and a format for "self-auditing" of instances where antibiotics were deemed unnecessary. "Outpatient antibiotic stewardship initiatives can reduce unnecessary antibiotic prescribing for Tier 3 URIs without increasing repeat respiratory healthcare contact," Mayo Clinic researchers wrote of the implementation's results. "Advancing age and number of comorbidities remain risk factors for persistent unnecessary antibiotic prescribing." n

• Cover