The mission of CEP is to support healthcare quality and safety at the University of Pennsylvania Health System (UPHS) through the practice of evidence-based medicine. To that end, the Center summarizes scientific evidence for UPHS decision making about high impact drugs, devices and processes of care, and is charged with building evidence-based collaborative enterprises with outside organizations.
News
UPHS Team Awarded for Using Information Technology to Reduce Catheter—Associated Urinary Tract Infections
12/04/2012 A Penn Medicine team led by Craig Umscheid, MD, MSCE, FACP, assistant professor of medicine and epidemiology and director of the Center for Evidence-based Practice has won the first place 2012 Health Care Improvement Foundation's (HCIF) "Patient Safety and Quality Award” for its work leveraging information technology to decrease catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs).
Established in 2002, the annual honor recognizes "innovative contributions in advancing patient care" and comes with a $5,000 grant to support future efforts in patient safety research. The award was announced at yesterday's annual meeting of the Delaware Valley Healthcare Council of the Hospital & Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania.
CAUTIs are the most common type of healthcare-associated infection. As much as 70 percent of CAUTIs may be preventable with recommended infection control measures; resulting in as many as 380,000 fewer infections and preventing as many as 9,000 deaths each year. To help eliminate these infections, the Penn Medicine Center for Evidence-based Practice (CEP) worked with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to revise the national guidelines on preventing CAUTIs. Then, leaders from Nursing, Infection Control, Quality and Safety, and Information Technology at Penn Medicine collaborated with CEP to integrate the guidelines into computerized clinical decision support to reduce CAUTIs locally.
Over about a year of using this system, the group found that the intervention helped physicians decide whether their patients needed urinary catheters, and alerted physicians when catheters needed to be removed (reducing the days they were used overall).
The life-saving technology, together with other health system interventions, reduced CAUTIs by about 50 percent over about one year. Estimates suggest this effort also led to an estimated financial savings of approximately $140,000 annually.
HCIF is an independent, nonprofit corporation that fosters healthcare initiatives aimed at improving the safety, outcomes, and care experiences in health care facilities across the five-county Philadelphia region.
Penn Medicine Partners with ECRI to Win Evidence-Based Practice Center Designation from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
9/18/2012 The University of Pennsylvania Health System’s Center for Evidence-based Practice, in partnership with the ECRI Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to researching approaches to improve patient care, has been selected by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) as one of its 11 Evidence-based Practice Centers (EPCs). This new EPC designation will allow ECRI Institute and Penn Medicine clinicians and researchers to bid for projects through AHRQ to review and synthesize literature on preventive, therapeutic and diagnostic interventions to assess which are most beneficial to patients. The work informs clinical practice guidelines for physicians and educational materials for patients, as well as health-care-related decisions by the federal government, states, and national medical societies, such as those related to the development of new measures of clinical effectiveness and quality.
“We are extremely excited to partner with ECRI on the synthesis of those research findings most important to our patients’ health,” says Craig A. Umscheid, MD, MS, a hospitalist at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, director of the Penn Medicine Center for Evidence-based Practice, and Senior Associate Director of the newly formed ECRI Institute-Penn Medicine EPC. “ECRI’s objectivity and methodologic soundness set the standard for the field of research synthesis. Combined with the breadth and depth of our faculty’s clinical and research expertise, and our Center’s local experience in supporting patient care through research synthesis and dissemination, we’ll be positioned to make a real difference.”
There are no specific dollar amounts that are guaranteed from winning this designation, but the designation itself allows the ECRI-Penn EPC as well as the other 10 AHRQ EPCs to compete for up to $50 million worth of contracts from AHRQ in the next five years.
“We are pleased and honored to hold the trust of AHRQ and the healthcare system more broadly in advancing the science of systematic review to assess the effectiveness of healthcare interventions and practices based on outcomes that matter to patients,” says Karen Schoelles, MD, SM, director of the ECRI Institute-Penn Medicine EPC.
CEP Staff Position Available
Healthcare Technology Assessment Analyst - Center for Evidence-Based Practice
University of Pennsylvania Health System
The mission of the University of Pennsylvania Health System (UPHS) Center for Evidence-Based Practice (CEP) is to support the quality, safety and value of patient care at UPHS through evidence-based practice. The CEP Analyst position is at the core of these translational activities, and is accountable for preparing evidence reviews to inform high impact clinical policy at UPHS. Secondary accountabilities include the dissemination and implementation of findings from the review process. Applicants should have experience in performing systematic reviews and meta-analyses, computer skills including expertise with Microsoft Office, statistical software and bibliographic management software, and a Masters degree or doctorate in clinical epidemiology or related fields, or a background in health technology assessment. Individuals with clinical proficiency are particularly encouraged to apply.
Interested candidates should contact Craig A Umscheid, MD, MSCE, Assistant Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology and Director of the UPHS Center for Evidence-based Practice for more information.
Email: craig.umscheid@uphs.upenn.edu
Center for Evidence-based Practice Website: visit http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/cep/
|
