The IPC Collaborative is central to improvement methodology and accelerates learning for all participating sites. We create a learning community through face-to-face meetings of the improvement teams, regular web-based teleconferences, and ongoing listserv dialogue for sharing questions, ideas, experience, and information.
The educational foundation of the collaborative is all teach and all learn. Trust is an essential factor in the collaborative process; we learn from what doesn’t work as well as what does work. As a result, teams share openly with each other within the secure relationship of the collaborative learning community.
“Prework” Period
The IPC Collaborative starts with a 10-week prework period that prepares sites for the more intense and accelerated process of the collaborative. Weekly teleconferences and assignments occur during this period. Prework is aimed at developing each site’s improvement team, assessing processes and experience of care, identifying the care team and panel of patients with which to test the Care Model change ideas on a small scale, and developing the capacity to use frequent measurement to guide improvement.
Action Period
The work of the collaborative is structured around action periods, during which the teams actively test changes by using the Model for Improvement. The action periods are anchored by one-hour, web-based teleconferences held every two weeks, during which topics critical to the improvement work are discussed. The improvement team coordinator, and as many team members as possible, join these web-based calls.
Learning Sessions
These intensive, 2-day meetings are scheduled every 2–3 months, bringing together the Collaborative’s improvement teams and the expert faculty to exchange ideas. The first two learning sessions are in-person. The second learning session includes a site visit to a health care organization that is well along on its improvement journey. Three to five team members, including the senior sponsor, are expected to attend these in-person learning sessions. Subsequent learning sessions are 2-day, web-based teleconferences that offer the opportunity for many more team members, and community members, to attend.
Measures
The IPC care teams are focusing on achievements in the following measures (grouped by category in italics).
Improve the Quality of Care
Government Performance and Results Act measures in prevention (cancer screening: colorectal, mammography, and cervical cancer)
Diabetes comprehensive care measures (A1C testing, cholesterol testing, blood pressure screening, eye exam, foot exam, and kidney disease assessments)
Health risk assessments for depression, domestic violence, tobacco screening and cessation, alcohol screening, body mass index screening, and blood pressure
Improve Access to Care
Assuring continuity of care to a care team and advanced access to care (same day) to a patient’s primary care provider
Reducing the third next available appointment to support same-day access for patients
Improving the efficiency and eliminating the waste of clinics by implementing strategies to improve clinical flow and optimizing the care teams to better serve the patient’s health needs at the point of visit
Patient Experience of Care
Improve the experience of care from the patient’s perspective and ensure that patients and families receive the right care, at the right time, every time
Ensure that reliable and consistent care is provided to meet the needs of all American Indians and Alaska Natives
