The Partnership for Healthcare Excellence

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FAQs

What is The Partnership for Healthcare Excellence?

The Partnership for Healthcare Excellence (the Partnership) is a new statewide effort designed to give patients a greater voice in improving the safety and effectiveness of their care. Through a comprehensive public education campaign, the Partnership seeks to give consumers tools and resources to improve the quality of the health care which they and their families receive.

Who is the Partnership for Healthcare Excellence?

The Board of Directors of the Partnership includes distinguished leaders from the medical, advocacy, public health and business communities.

The Partnership’s Leadership Council draws on the knowledge and talents of individuals and organizations from all corners of the health care community including physicians, nurses, public health and patient advocates, hospitals, insurers, business leaders, as well as representatives from civic and community organizations.

Marilyn Schlein Kramer is the Executive Director of the Partnership. She brings more than 20 years experience on the cutting edge of efforts to harness the power of information technology to improve health care quality to this effort.

What does the Partnership do?

The Partnership is working to educate and motivate consumers to improve the quality of their health care. It plans to reach consumers through a new print advertising campaign, and a new website (www.partnershipforhealthcare.org) that includes information and resources specifically designed to make it easier for consumers to become more active participants in their own care. In addition, the Partnership will be working in collaboration with its community partners to help spread the word about the importance of becoming an engaged patient through local events, forums and other venues.

Does the Partnership have specific goals?

The goals of the Partnership are threefold:

To educate the public about the variations in health care quality;

To provide consumers with the information and tools they need to improve the quality of their own care; and

To encourage consumers to become advocates for the overall change necessary to improve the safety and effectiveness of the health care system.

How is the Partnership different from other health care initiatives?

While many organizations are working at the system level to improve health care quality, the Partnership is uniquely focused on engaging with consumers so they can play a greater role in improving the quality of their health care, as well as the quality delivered by the overall health care system.

Why is it important to educate consumers about health care quality?

The Partnership believes that everyone deserves the highest quality health care. However, in our current system, that is not always the case. While the science of health care is advancing at breakneck speed, the system for delivering it has not kept pace. The Institute of Medicine has reported that “serious and widespread quality problems exist throughout American medicine” and that 1.5 million Americans are injured by medication errors every year. Research conducted by the Partnership shows that nearly one in five adults in Massachusetts has experienced a medical error, while 52 percent know someone who has.

Research further shows that consumers are keenly aware that problems with health care quality and safety exist and are eager for information to help them make informed health care decisions. The Partnership is working to make it easier for consumers to get engaged by providing them with useful tools and resources that they can use to improve the quality of their care.