Quality Improvement
Forum Webinar: How to Identify and Eliminate the Hidden Costs of Poor Quality
September 22, 2016
5:03 pm
During this Sept. 8, 2016, HFMA Forum webinar, a health system CEO and chair of surgery discussed how finance and clinical leaders can work together to identify and eliminate quality-related costs. Key takeaways from their discussion include the following.
Poor quality affects the bottom line. Poor quality can cost as much as $250,000 per project, and in some cases that amount exceeds CMS withholds, says David Kashmer, MD, MBA, chair of surgery, Signature Healthcare. A tool called the COPQ (Cost Of Poor Quality) helps to reveal the true costs we experience owing to poor quality.
Avoid typical quality pitfalls. The following are areas to watch while implementing quality programs, says Kashmer.
- Scope creep, the project gets too big.
- Poor or no champion to promote and move the initiative along.
- Lack of early input by stakeholders.
Understand where we’ve been and where we are headed. “In the past, healthcare providers only saw quality defects post event,” says Kim Hollon, CEO, Signature Healthcare. “We are still in the beginning stages of finding quality defects as they occur and seeing them during the hand-off process throughout the continuum of care. There will be significant growth in that area in the next five to 10 years,” says Hollon.
Related article: What is Quality Worth? Quantifying Potential Cost Savings
