AAAASF Educational Foundation to Present Patient Safety Summit Conference on Accreditation

GURNEE, Ill. -- On January 26, 2007, the American Association for Accreditation of Ambulatory Surgery Facilities Education Foundation (AAAASFEF), along with representatives from AAAHC, JCAHO, AOA, ACS, CMS, NHC and others, will present a summit to enhance the level of patient safety in office-based surgery settings. One of the key initiatives to be proposed will be to establish baseline information on the status of accreditation as a strategy by which to improve the level of patient safety in office based surgical settings. The conference moderator will be Thomas Russell, MD, of the American College of Surgeons.

The goals and objective of the Patient Safety Conference are as follows:

1. Establish baseline information on the status of accreditation as a strategy by which to improve the level of patient safety in office based surgical settings.

2. Create a series of initiatives that the accrediting agencies can collaborate on a continuing basis that will improve patient safety in the office based surgery (OBS) setting.

3. Provide evidence and a value equation that accreditation of OBS practices enhances patient safety

A summit highlight will be a discussion on whether there is a need for evidence-based reporting to address safety issues, which will be presented by R. Scott Jones of the ACS.  His address will raise important questions about patient care:

• In what manner will the necessary data be gathered and analyzed so that evidence-based decisions can be made to set directions for increasing the level of patient safety in the OBS practice setting?

• What organizations are eligible to collect the data?

•  How can competitive advantage be prevented from becoming a factor?

•  How will this help to improve the level of patient safety in the OBS setting?

Examining the topic of patient safety from a national multi-discipline perspective, a panel discussion will evaluate what patient advocacy groups want to see in an OBS practice environment as an improvement of patient safety measures. 

An important outcome to be determined is identifying collaborative efforts among the accrediting agencies to advance the level of patient safety in the office based surgical setting and to make fuller use of accreditation as a strategy by which to improve the levels of patient safety in the OBS.

Source: American Association for Accreditation of Ambulatory Surgery Facilities, Inc. (AAAASF)

Share this article: Email, Slashdot, Digg, Del.icio.us, Yahoo!MyWeb, Windows Live Favorites, Furl
Add this article feed to: RSS, My Yahoo, Newsgator, Bloglines

Read Comments [0]