Dear Friends and Colleagues:

Crozer-Keystone Health System (CKHS) is pleased to present the Sixth Annual Report on Quality. The report highlights the health system’s ongoing quality initiatives and some specific strides we have made.

This past year has seen a significant public discussion on Quality of Care at both a national and local level. The National Academy of Sciences’s Institute of Medicine has continued to provide guidance with their ground-breaking report, “Priority Areas for National Action: Transforming Health Care Quality”, released earlier this year. For the first time the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality is preparing an annual national report on quality due to be released this fall.

In addition, The American Hospital Association (AHA), along with the Association of American Medical Colleges and the Federation of American Hospitals has initiated a project, “The Quality Initiative: A Public Resource on Hospital Performance.” AHA-affiliated associations, including The Hospital & Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania have endorsed the project. The National Quality Foundation has also issued its initial set of guidelines regarding hospital quality of care and the New England Journal of Medicine has just published its major study on “The Quality of Health Care Delivered to Adults in the United States.”1

In the spirit of these national and state initiatives, CKHS continues to address a range of quality issues. The 2002 CKHS report on quality focused primarily on patient safety, and in particular medication safety, which is still at the forefront of quality initiatives at CKHS. The last section of this report outlines 2003 accomplishments in patient safety.

The federal government’s Healthy People (HP) 2010 guidelines for health indicators serve as a benchmark for how well CKHS is achieving quality healthcare goals in such areas as maternal, infant, and child health, cardiovascular health, early detection of cancer, behavioral health, and wellness and fitness. This report highlights inroads towards meeting many HP 2010 goals.

The Crozer-Keystone Health System has seen many achievements and improvements in quality in the last 12 months. The Healthy Start program, which is vital to CKHS’s success in reaching HP 2010 objectives for improving maternal, infant, and child health, has received renewed funding of $3.5 million through 2005. CKHS has also made headway in better managing heart disease. In a CKHS Community Health 2002 survey, 97 percent of the adults questioned reported having their blood pressure checked, exceeding the national HP 2010 goal of 95 percent. Between 2001 and 2002, CKHS substantially improved its consistency in delivering care for acute myocardial infarction based on evidence-based medicine standards, exceeding benchmark targets for administering aspirin, beta blockers, and ACE inhibitors.

These achievements were recognized as CKHS received the 2003 VHA Leadership Award for Clinical Effectiveness. Also this year, the Kids Asthma Management Program, a school-based program to reduce the incidence of asthma in the Chester-Upland School District, received the 2003 Achievement Award from the Hospital & Health System Association of Pennsylvania.

Many of CKHS’s goals and positive outcomes were highlighted at the annual Quality of Care retreat, held this past June. The retreat featured an update on medication safety initiatives as well as community outreach, evidence-based medicine, and programs that encourage enhanced patient participation in their health care, which are outlined in this report.

We encourage you to review the Sixth Annual Report on Quality to become familiar with the many CKHS programs that strive to bring outstanding healthcare to our patients. Thank you.

Gerald Miller
President and Chief Executive Officer
Crozer-Keystone Health System 

1. E.A. McGlynn et al., “The quality of health care delivered to adults in the United States,” New England Journal of Medicine, 348:2635-45, 2003.