The Medicare Quality Improvement Organization for Mississippi
Information & Quality Healthcare (IQH), a not-for-profit corporation chartered in 1971 in Mississippi, serves as the federally designated Quality Improvement Organization (QIO) for the state. IQH works under contract with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to improve the quality of health care for Medicare beneficiaries. By serving as a resource for the state's health care providers and for Medicare beneficiaries, IQH fulfills its mission by providing leadership and consultative services to ensure that all Mississippians receive the right care at the right time, care that is safe, effective, efficient and timely. QIO Contract Number: HHSM-500-2008-MS9THC.
IQH has been a resource and catalyst for health care improvement in Mississippi for over 37 years. The IQH vision is for a health care system that has the capacity to continually improve care and outcomes for the state's citizens. IQH professionals include physicians, nurses, health information administrators, data analysts and other quality experts working in teams to achieve the strategic goals of transforming health care in Mississippi.
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Visit www.msqio.org
Data, updates, events, and resources are now available at www.msqio.org, the Information & Quality Healthcare (IQH) website focusing on quality improvement efforts underway throughout the state. Partners, collaborators and other interested persons are encouraged to visit www.msqio.org for opportunities for registration for upcoming meetings and to access helpful tools. IQH as the state’s Medicare Quality Improvement Organization (QIO) partners with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) coordinating efforts for better health for people and communities and affordable care through lowering costs by improvement. The focus continues on improving patient safety and preventive care working with Mississippi nursing homes, hospitals, physicians and others, with emphasis on community approaches to improving care.
QIO Changes Proposed in Legislation
In recent Congressional-approved legislation, massive changes in the current Medicare quality improvement program were included as a funding offset for an amendment reauthorizing Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) and are expected to garner more than $300 million in savings. Among the proposed changes are reforms that call for the regionalization of quality improvement organizations (QIO) contracts beginning on or after Jan. 1, 2012. These changes could strip all state-based QIOs throughout the country of their local functions, damage relationships with state stakeholders and remove the long-standing role of local physicians in conducting peer review and quality improvement activities in their own states.
Information & Quality Healthcare (IQH) has been the Mississippi QIO for the past 40 years. In eliminating IQH’s statewide scope, the reforms also allow CMS to award separate contracts for case review and quality improvement functions. IQH employs 35 people as health professionals dealing with this contract. The passage of this legislation not only will cause a negative economic impact of lost jobs for the state but will take away local decisions and assistance which may adversely affect physicians, hospitals, nursing homes, communities, and Medicare patients.
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Improving Health and Health Care for all Medicare Beneficiaries
The presentation “Improving Health and Health Care for all Medicare Beneficiaries: Promoting Quality of Care to Ensure the Right Care at the Right Time” is an overview designed to share current quality improvement initiatives being conducted by the nation’s Medicare Quality Improvement Organizations (QIOs), working with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). At the October state meeting of the Mississippi Nurses Association, Mary Helen Conner, BSN, MPH, MCHES, project leader at Information & Quality Healthcare (IQH), Mississippi’s Medicare QIO, presented information that covered the acronyms populating the health care improvement efforts and defined the Quality Improvement efforts for the next three years. The four QIO program AIMS are shared in this presentation, including the focus on beneficiary and family centered care; improvement of individual patient care; integration of care for populations (care transitions); and improvement of health for populations and communities. IQH works with, hospitals, physicians, home health agencies, and nursing homes to improve the quality of health care.
FDA’s Graphic Cigarette Warning Labels Revealed
New labels will help prevent children from smoking and help adults quit
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has unveiled the nine graphic health warnings required to appear on every pack of cigarettes sold in the United States and in every cigarette advertisement. The measure is designed to help prevent children from smoking, encourage adults who do smoke to quit, and ensure that every American understands the dangers of smoking.
The warnings represent the most significant changes to cigarette labels in more than 25 years and will affect everything from packaging to advertisements and are required to be placed on all cigarette packs, cartons and ads no later than September 2012.
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