Schwimmer Script Blog
COVID-19 Tests Our Strengths — Highlights Our Weaknesses
Over the past few weeks, like most of you, I’ve been washing my hands consistently — trying not to touch my face — and keeping up on the news and public health directives surrounding the Coronavirus (COVID-19). To me, the global outbreak highlights several important health care issues. First, the virus shows, in real and…Read More…
Volume Matters When It Comes to Surgical Safety – New Leapfrog Report Out
As Regional Leader for The Leapfrog Group, an independent national health care watchdog organization, we are sharing the just-released report, Safety In Numbers: Hospital Performance on Leapfrog’s Surgical Volume Standard Based on Results of the 2019 Leapfrog Hospital Survey. The report analyzes whether hospitals are performing a sufficient volume of high-risk surgeries to perform the…Read More…
Spotlight on Health Care Transparency
Last week in Burlington City, I stood in a family health center that was crowded with state health care leaders and others applauding as Governor Murphy officially created the new Office of Health Care Affordability and Transparency. As the Quality Institute, we have long called for an office that could align the health care related…Read More…
Exclusive Interview with Christin Deacon, Office of the Treasury
The Quality Institute’s origins go back to the New Jersey Payer Coalition, which was a group of union funds that were purchasing health care for their members but had no information about the quality or safety of the care. All they knew was that the costs were going up, and they had little to no…Read More…
Top Health Care Issues for New Jersey in 2020
As we move into the first year of a new decade, we want to highlight some pressing issues in health care, especially areas where the Quality Institute, together with our members, can make a real impact. Supporting Healthy Aging: As a state, we aren’t getting any younger. In 2010, people over the age of sixty…Read More…
Scoring Payment Reform in the Garden State
Two numbers struck me after reading Catalyst for Payment Reform’s New Jersey Scorecard: 80 and 20. In our state’s commercial market, the share of total dollars paid to specialists (outpatient and inpatient) is 80 percent compared with just 20 percent to primary care providers. The national figures are only slightly better: 75 and 25 percent….Read More…
New Staffers Strengthen Quality Institute’s Mission
At the Quality Institute, three new policy staff members with impressive real-world experience have joined our mission to drive health care quality, access, and affordability. Their backgrounds in government, administration, hospitals, and finance will strengthen our impact in New Jersey. I’m excited to introduce them to you. First, let me tell you about Amanda R. Burd,…Read More…
Seeing Health Care Policy Turn Into Practice
At the Quality Institute, I work to encourage change that makes health care safer, more accessible and more coordinated. Often the changes in policy I explore do not affect the real-world practice of medicine until years later. So I am always excited when I see real investments in health care policy and infrastructure play out…Read More…
When Spending Health Care Dollars, “Choosing Wisely” Is Best Course
The cost of health insurance is rising. Again. High premiums, co-pays and cost sharing are hurting businesses and their employees. Insurers are pulling out of the ACA health insurance market in New Jersey and around the nation. U.S. health care spending, meanwhile, has reached $3.0 trillion, taking money away from housing, education, social services and…Read More…