DorlandHealth

Maureen Bisognano, BSN, MSN, is the executive vice president and chief operating officer of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI). Ms. Bisognano is on the faculty of the Harvard School of Public Health, an elected member of the Institute of Medicine, and a member of the Commonwealth Fund’s Commission on a High Performance Health System.

Q: Safety and quality are on the minds of practitioners, providers and consumers. How is IHI leading the movement to ensure a safer experience for consumers who enter today’s health care system?

A: IHI sees one of its most important roles as that of “sense-maker” — a place that improvers can turn to for help and guidance in creating a balanced, sensible plan for making the kinds of changes that result in safe, high-quality care, greater efficiency, and more joy in work.

Jeanne Boling, MSN, CCM, a case management consultant for Global Wealth Management Inc., offers a national perspective on direct-to-consumer case management. She is the former executive director of the Case Management Society of America.

Q: As a leader in the practice of case management, what new frontiers do you see for case managers?

A: The consumer-driven health care movement has placed more decision making directly with consumers, which has increased their need for professional support. Direct-to-consumer case management is a new category of case management addressing this need. Traditionally, case management has come from managed care organizations, providers and independent workers’ compensation firms, all of which tended to emphasize  financial concerns over patient care. The current economic recession has only intensified this focus.

Toni G. Cesta, Ph.D., RN, FAAN, is the corporate vice president, Patient Flow Optimization for the North Shore, Long Island Jewish Health System in Great Neck, N.Y., and a health care consultant and partner in Case Management Concepts LLC.

Q: You have long been a leader in addressing efficiency of patient flow. Can you describe patient flow and tell us why it is important?

A: Patient flow is the management of all the patient care processes that support the patient as he or she transitions through the current episode of care. In the hospital setting, patient flow is considered one of the strategic activities used to manage length of stay and cost of care. For the case manager, it incorporates the activities of coordination and facilitation of care. The goals of patient flow/coordination and facilitation of care include: