Chair’s Initiatives Fund Innovative Ideas to Improve Care
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Community Impact Report When Alan Cohen, MD, was Physician-in-chief at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, he would hear about potential ways to improve pediatric healthcare from the doctors, nurses and other staff. But putting those ideas into action was sometimes constrained by lack of time and funding.
That’s why in 2004, Cohen, with the backing of the Department of Pediatrics and support from Operating Officer Alison Marx, launched the Chair’s Initiatives, an internal grant program that funds promising improvement projects — giving those with the ideas the means to develop them. Operating on a two-year cycle, teams submit proposals, and a multidisciplinary team selects the winning projects.
“It’s been rewarding that the Chair’s Initiatives have given life to so many great ideas,” says Cohen, a Hematologist who stepped down as Chief in 2013 and now serves as Medical Adviser to CHOP President and CEO Madeline Bell. “Projects have touched every corner of the Hospital, gone into our CHOP Care Network primary care practices, and even entered our patient families’ homes.”
Over the years, Chair’s Initiatives have addressed a wide array of healthcare challenges, everything from developing a system that reduces missed appointments to drafting guidelines that improve the effective use of anticoagulant (blood thinner) therapy and creating a web portal to help families manage their child’s chronic disease.
Some Chair’s Initiatives have spawned new centers or programs that focus on a specific disease or condition, such as the Intestinal Rehabilitation Program (for children with short bowel syndrome), the Center for Bone Health, and Minds Matter Concussion Program.
When Joseph W. St. Geme, MD, became Physician-in-chief, he continued the Chair’s Initiatives in collaboration with Kathy Shaw, MD, MSCE, Associate Chair, Quality and Safety, Department of Pediatrics, and Marx.
“This program has had a remarkable impact on patient care across our organization, fueling continuing advances that distinguish CHOP from other top children’s hospitals,” says St. Geme.
The 2014–15 round, the program’s fourth, continued prior focuses on quality and patient safety, including clinical guidelines, outcomes measurement and piloting of different care models to deliver accessible, high-quality care at lower cost and coordinate complex, accountable care across disciplines.
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