The Society to Improve Diagnosis in Medicine (SIDM) https://improvediagnosis.org has issued their second grant round totaling $3 million over three years as part of the organization’s Diagnostic Quality Improvement (DxQI) Seed Grant Program.
Sixteen organizations will receive up to $50,000 to test interventions to improve the quality, accuracy, and timeliness of diagnoses.
“Inaccurate or delayed diagnoses are the most common, catastrophic, and costly of all medical errors,” said Paul L. Epner, CEO SIDM. “The DxQI Seed Grant Program is designed to stimulate innovation in the field of diagnostic quality, an area where practice improvement activity is lagging.”
The program will help clinicians, hospitals, and health systems take specific steps to improve diagnostic quality and safety by building an evidence base of effective interventions. Once tested, SIDM will create a clearinghouse for the interventions and be a catalyst for the adoption of effective practices by other organizations across the country.
Some of the grant awards went to:
- Beth Israel Lahey Health Primary Care–developing a data driven Community Health Navigator model to identify primary care patients at high risk for a missed or delayed cancer screening ordered during virtual visits. The goal is to increase the equity and quality of care provided to these patients
- Cook County Health–using electronic medical record language preference tools to decrease infection related diagnostic errors in patients with limited English proficiency
- Mayo Clinic–using a decision support system integrated into a clinical workflow to improve the quality and standard of echocardiogram reports to reduce diagnostic errors of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy
- NYC Health + Hospitals/Harlem–developing a single dashboard that all members of the diagnosis and treatment team can easily access patients in a timely manner moving through the diagnosis and treatment process for Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy (HCM)
- University of Alabama at Birmingham—using nurse coordinators, communication tools, and an appointment tracking database to increase the detection and management of acute chest syndrome and asthma in pediatric patients with sickle cell disease
- University of Iowa–creating a Clinical Decision Support Tool to identify patients at risk for undiagnosed primary immunodeficiencies to help them navigate the healthcare system
- University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center—improving the identification and treatment of pediatric sepsis with new tools and training across a diverse patient population
Ultimately, the DxQI program will help clinicians, hospitals, and health systems take specific steps to improve diagnostic quality and safety by building an evidence base of effective interventions. Once tested, SIDM will create a clearinghouse of the interventions and be a catalyst for the adoption of effective practices to help other organizations across the county.
Go to https://improveddiagnosis.org/news for more information on the additional grantees.