November 1, 2017
A Global Look At Our Health Care System
I was recently lucky enough to spend some time in Europe. We saw ancient aqueducts and sewers (early public health initiatives), some of the oldest buildings in the world, and ate too much cheese. Luckily I didn’t need to interact with the health care system in any of these countries – but I can’t help…
Read more »September 28, 2017
We want your comments on our recommendations!
September was a busy month for the Bree Collaborative. We finalized three of our reports for dissemination for public comment – Alzheimer’s Disease and Other Dementias, Opioid Use Disorder Treatment, and our re-review of the Total Knee and Total Hip Replacement Bundle. Now we want to hear from you! Information on submitting comments on all…
Read more »September 1, 2017
Communication Resolution Programs: Reshaping Response to Patient Harm
Despite the best efforts of health care providers and organizations, patients sometimes experience unanticipated and undesirable outcomes in their care. In these cases, open and honest communication with the patient and family is critical to maintaining trust and respect while not compounding patient suffering. In recent years, Communication and Resolution Programs (CRP) have emerged in response to…
Read more »August 18, 2017
Building Health Equity
“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.” – Dr. Martin Luther King, 1966 I believe that everyone deserves their best chance at being healthy. Unfortunately, our country still has a long way to go. How healthy we are and whether we can get the type of health…
Read more »August 1, 2017
Emerging Research on the Impacts of Diet on Dementia
Since January 2017, the Bree Collaborative’s Alzheimer’s Disease and Other Dementias workgroup has been compiling recommendations to align care delivery for patients, as well as families and caregivers, with best practices using existing evidence-based standard of care for diagnosis, treatment, supportive care, transitions of care, delirium, and advance care planning. One of the most common…
Read more »July 4, 2017
A Summer Reading List
This month I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Keith Wailoo, Professor of History and Public Affairs at Princeton University, when he spoke at the University of Washington Medical Center, Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine’s annual lecture. Dr. Wailoo spoke about his book, Pain: A Political History, giving a historical perspective of our nation’s…
Read more »June 15, 2017
Selecting New Topics for 2018
Every year our members select new topics. This is an exciting time for our Collaborative – a chance to look back at our previous work and to think about how we can continue to help improve health care quality, outcomes, and affordability in our community. We will start our conversation on new topics at our…
Read more »June 1, 2017
Working Together to Impact the Opioid Epidemic
Right now our workgroups are looking at both opioid prescribing and opioid use disorder treatment – focusing on prevention and on building our health system treatment infrastructure. We welcome you to join either of these conversations – and especially to give us feedback on our metrics to track opioid prescribing that are currently out for…
Read more »May 8, 2017
Introducing the Implementation Roadmap and Survey Results
The Bree Collaborative has worked to survey the impact of our recommendations in hospitals, medical groups, and health plans since May 2016. From reducing inappropriate caesarian sections to improving end-of-life care, our survey shows where our recommendations or other similar quality improvements have been implemented. From this information we created an Implementation Roadmap outlining next…
Read more »May 1, 2017
Health Care Authority Requests Information on Bundled Episodes of Care
The Bree Collaborative develops bundled payments or episodes of care in our Accountable Payment Models workgroup – we are currently re-reviewing our Total Knee and Total Hip Replacement Bundle and Warranty and invite you to be a part of this conversation here. The Health Care Authority is also working to transform our health care system. In…
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