On April 9, 2005, CHCQ's CLARION team won first place in the CLARION National Case Competition. Ashley Mahon, from the School of Nursing, Kevin Norris, from the School of Health Professions, Brian Stout, from Health Management and Informatics, and Rusty McCulloh, from the School of Medicine, presented their root cause analyses, cost analyses, and recommendations for quality improvement for a specific case to the CLARION National Case Competition Judges. The University of Missouri CLARION team competed against six other teams from schools across the country: University of Chicago, University of Conneticut, Dartmouth University, University of Minnesota, University of Tennessee, and University of Wisconsin -- Madison. The students were accompanied to the competition by the School of Nursing's Kathryn Burks, PhD, RN, and they were supported by faculty representatives from the different schools -- Kris Hagglund, PhD, from the School of Health Professions, Steve Brooks, MD, from the School of Medicine, and Kathryn Nelson, MHA, from the department of Health Management and Informatics. Kathryn Nelson, MHA, was the team's faculty contact, and helped to coordinate their learning and get them access to resources. The Center for Health Care Quality served as the administrative host for the CLARION team, providing them with meeting space and coordinating their resource requests.
As first place winners, the students will receive a $5,000 team scholarship, a trip to the Institute for Healthcare Improvement's National Forum, and acknowledgement at the Forum by Don Berwick, MD, MPP, who is a charismatic leader in quality improvement innovation.
The CLARION National Case Competition is an outgrowth of the University of Minnesota's regional case competitions, which were designed and administered by medical students in response to their perception of the need for interproffesional education and training in root cause analysis and practice-based problem-solving. In their own words, CLARION organizers say that "[i]ssues of quality and patient safety in health care have received have received national attention since a report released by the Institute of Medicine in 1999 indicated that as many as 98,000 people in America may die each year due to medical errors. With a lack of communication being cited as one possible cause of these errors, interprofessional education has come to the forefront of health care curricula everywhere." CLARION organizers are also interested in training health-care professionalis in interprofessional communication early on in their careers so that they take this skill with them into their professional lives.
This year's CLARION case did focus on lack of communication issues. If you would like to read the case for the competiton, you may find the case on the CLARION web site. The web site also provides the presentations from the February kick-off retreat, and the case competition winner from 2004.
Be sure to congratulate our students if you know them. They are truly the best and the brightest!
MU Healthcare's press release.
Please visit the Institute for Healthcare Improvement's congratulatory piece.
-- Health Management and Informatics
-- School of Health Professions
Congratulations to our CLARION CASE COMPETITION WINNERS!