Registry Partners recently attended the American College of Surgeons (ACS) 2019 Quality and Safety Conference in Washington, DC. This annual event is hosted by ACS and focuses on the improvement of surgical care and patient safety and is targeted to those facilities and organizations participating in one of the many ACS quality improvement programs, including National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP) and Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery Accreditation and Quality Improvement Program (MBSAQIP).
The theme for the conference this year was “Putting our Patients FIRST”, and was specifically designed for anyone who “strives to improve surgical quality and safety, with the overarching goal of inspiring everyone to continually aim for optimal care and outcomes – for each and every patient.” as Clifford Ko, Md. Director of the ACS Division of Research And Optimal Patient Care pointed out in his opening remarks.
We started the conference on the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing on the moon (July 20,1969). Paralleling with many of the goal setting and leadership principles that were presented, we were reminded of the goals of the late President John F Kennedy for putting a Man on the moon, when he addressed the Congress of the United States in May 1961. These same guiding words of set, achieve, measure, difficult are used today.
The keynote address was delivered by Rana Awdish, MD. She is the director of the pulmonary hypertension program and a critical care physician at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, MI. She is also the medical director of care experience for Henry Ford Health System where she is charged with improving the patient experience across the system and speaking on patient advocacy at health care seminars nationally. She never imagined that an emergency trip to the hospital would result in hemorrhaging nearly all of her blood volume and losing her unborn first child.
Dr. Awdish spent months fighting for her life, enduring consecutive major operations and experiencing multiple overlapping organ failures. Dr. Awdish recorded her experience in a collection of personal essays that laid the framework for her book, In Shock. She spent time with us retelling these experiences during her session at the conference which brought much of the audience to tears.
We had several days that consisted of various sessions on the following important topics:
- Value improvement
- Bundled care
- Global health
- Change management
- Leadership principles
- Team dynamics
- Strong for Surgery
- Enhanced recovery
- Emergency general surgery
- Transplantation
- Geriatric Surgical Verification program
We look forward to attending the conference again next year.