Acknowledgments

William Spector, PhD, Senior Social Scientist at AHRQ, acted as project officer for this task order to develop a toolkit. Rhona Limcangco, PhD, Health Analyst at AHRQ, provided additional support in carrying out the project.

The development of this toolkit was facilitated by the assistance of quality improvement teams at six medical centers: Joyce Dolin, Jena Reilly, and Kendra Belkin at Charlton Memorial Hospital (Fall River, MA); Jerry Lockett, Clover Irving-Wiggins, and Mariely Maldonado at Florida Hospital East Orlando (Orlando, FL); Martha Syms, Kelley Williams, and Kaye McMullin at St. Mary's Regional Medical Center (Enid, OK); Myka Whitman, Emmet Polster, and Amanda Mahaffee at Northwest Texas Hospital (Amarillo, TX); Linda Gehring, Marie Cicerone, and Sarah Knuckles at Temple University Hospital (Philadelphia, PA); and Pat Benson, Michele Davis, and Terry Bryan at Augusta Health (Fishersville, VA). We thank them for their valuable contributions.

We also thank the authors of the evidence review that provided background information for this toolkit: Susanne Hempel, PhD; Sydne Newberry, PhD; Zhen Wang, PhD; Paul G. Shekelle, MD, PhD; Roberta Shanman, MS; Breanne Johnsen; and Tanja Perry.

We thank Walid Gellad, MD, our internal peer reviewer as part of RAND's quality assurance process, for his constructive and detailed comments.

We thank our technical expert panel, Katherine Berg, PT, PhD; Sharon K. Inouye, MD, MPH; Suzan N. Kucukarslan, RPh, PhD; Dale M. Needham, MD, PhD; Julia B. Neily, RN, MS, MPH; Patricia Quigley, ARNP, PhD; Laurence Rubenstein, MD, MPH; Blair L. Sadler, J.D.; Stephanie Studenski, MD, MPH; and Catherine (Cait) Walsh, RN, MSN, for their advice on this document.

We also thank Andrew Bernard, MD, and colleagues at University of Kentucky Medical Center and UK Healthcare; Cynthia J. Brown, MD, MSP.H; Patricia C. Dykes, DNSc, RN, FAAN, FACMI; Anne M. Drolet, MS, ANP-BC, CCRN; Victoria Fraser, MD; Terry Haines, PhD; Frances Healey, RN, PhD; Serena Koh, RN, PhD; David Oliver, MB, BChir, DGM, DME, MHM, MD, MSc, MA, FRCP; and Ronald I. Shorr, MD, MS, for sharing their advice and materials.

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