ASQ Advocacy Efforts Result in Development of
Healthcare Reform Task Force
January 6, 2010 — ASQ continues to ensure that quality fundamentals play a key role in overhauling healthcare in the United States.
ASQ met with Dr. David Blumenthal at ONC (the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology) in Washington, D.C. in November 2009.
ASQ has formed a task force to provide information requested by Dr. Blumenthal in two primary areas.
- Transition health IT initiatives from a focus on technology to a focus on quality improvement. ONC and ASQ both expressed interest in moving from a narrow focus on implementing IT to a systematic emphasis on quality improvement and organization-wide change management encompassing process and culture issues.
- Use the Baldrige Criteria for small physician practices.
ASQ also provided comment on a proposed set of health IT workforce competencies. This was in response to a request made at the meeting by the deputy national coordinator.
The task force is under the guidance of Kay Kendall, chair of ASQ’s Public Policy Advisory Council, and Doug Sears, director of performance improvement/knowledge transfer at Bon Secours Health System.
Dr. Blumenthal reached out to ASQ to assist him in his work of transforming healthcare in the United States using advances in information technology. He and his colleagues at the meeting had many questions for ASQ, and it was clear that they saw value in what ASQ brings to the table.
ASQ is maintaining contact with ONC and will schedule a follow-up meeting once the task force has gathered information in response to Dr. Blumenthal’s requests.
