National Healthcare Quality and Disparities Report
Latest available findings on quality of and access to health care
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Key Drivers
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EvidenceNOW: Tools and Resources
The Agency for Healthcare and Quality (AHRQ) offers practical, research-based tools and other resources to help a variety of health care origanizations, provider, and others make care safer in all health care settings. AHRQ's evidence-based tools and resources are used by organizations nationwide to improve the quality, safety, effectiveness, and efficiency of health care. Improving health care quality by increasing the capacity of small primary care practices to implement the best clinical evidence is our aim. These tools and resources can be searched by the key drivers and the change strategies of the EvidenceNOW Key Driver Diagram.
Results
1 to 10 of 12 Tools and Resources DisplayedThis toolkit introduces the ABCS of heart health and provides checklists, action plans, and other instructions to guide primary care practices to implement evidence-based guidelines, transform health care delivery, and improve patients’ heart health.
Part of an AHRQ curriculum used to train practice facilitators, this resource explains the fundamentals of building and working with quality improvement (QI) teams in primary care practices.
This is an example template that could be adapted for use in your EHR to ensure a clear understanding of how the patient is monitoring and adhering to recommended treatment for their cardiovascular health, focused on hypertension, cholesterol, and smoking.
This 1-page tool provides advice on how to reach out to patients for follow-up visits or care effectively. It includes examples of outreach messages to patients with hypertension and who smoke.
This resource explains how to create and maintain standardized, up-to-date patient problem lists in electronic health records (EHRs) in order to improve practices’ ability to generate accurate quality improvement data.
Based on real-world experience, this manual guides primary care practices through the process of developing and implementing clinical decision support (CDS), from defining the project through implementation and sustaining improvements.
This resource summarizes proven ways to communicate to patients and families about the importance of evidence-based care and the implications for their health. It includes examples of practice mission statements that convey that message.
A tool to help primary care practices screen and refer patients for social needs such as food or housing, so-called social determinants of health (SDOH) which, when identified, can help tailor care to patients’ circumstances.
This short article describes four coping stages that organizations go through when metrics show poor performance: denial of the data accuracy, denial there is a problem, deny accountability for the problem, and acceptance of responsibility.
This case study of a primary care practice provides insight into the clinic’s quality improvement project to improve blood pressure control. It highlights the steps in the quality improvement (QI) process, future measures, and lessons learned.