Newswise — The American Medical Group Association (AMGA), in collaboration with the American Medical Group Foundation (AMGF) and Daiichi Sankyo, Inc., an emerging leader in cardiovascular care, is providing grants for quality improvement initiatives focusing on the management of hypertension. Recipients are medical groups, IPAs, academic practices, and integrated delivery systems that responded to a request for proposals distributed in February 2008. An expert panel reviewed applications and selected recipients based on their ability to realize significant improvements in the care of hypertensive patients over the coming year.
The following medical groups will receive $20,000 educational grants over a two-year period to support their quality improvement efforts through participation in the Best Practices in Managing Hypertension Learning Collaborative:
"¢ Edmonds Family Medicine Clinic, Edmonds, Washington"¢ Fletcher Allen Health Care / University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont"¢ Great Falls Clinic, LLP, Great Falls, Montana"¢ Hattiesburg Clinic, P.A., Hattiesburg, Mississippi"¢ Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit, Michigan"¢ PriMed Physicians, Dayton, Ohio"¢ Riverside Medical Group, Newport News, Virginia"¢ Sharp Rees-Stealy Medical Group, San Diego, California"¢ St. Mary's/Duluth Clinic Health System, Duluth, Minnesota"¢ ThedaCare, Inc., Appleton, Wisconsin
In addition, several medical groups have been invited to participate in the collaborative on an unfunded basis:
"¢ Billings Clinic, Billings, Montana"¢ Vanderbilt Medical Center - Vanderbilt Medical Group, Nashville, Tennessee
The Learning Collaborative supports improvements in hypertensive care in the ambulatory healthcare setting. The program offers a shared learning environment where participants can exchange strategies and experiences as they work to improve the care provided to patients with hypertension. This initiative is important because the prevalence of hypertension continues to increase, and it now affects nearly 50 million people in the United States. Individuals who are hypertensive or pre-hypertensive have a greater risk for developing kidney disease and cardiovascular disease, which includes heart attack, heart failure, and stroke.
The mission of the Learning Collaborative is to encourage programs targeting improvement in the management of hypertension. Participating project teams will be able to regularly network with peers, participate in bi-monthly conference calls on relevant project topics, attend two in-person meetings, and have timely access to industry experts. The Learning Collaborative will begin in November 2008 and continue through October 2009. Daiichi Sankyo, Inc. provided support for the Learning Collaborative.
The American Medical Group Association (AMGA) is an association that represents medical groups, including some of the nation's largest, most prestigious organized systems of care. AMGA advocates for multispecialty medical groups and other organized systems of care, and for the patients served by these systems, by continuously striving to improve patient care through innovation, information sharing, benchmarking, the creation of sound public policy, and leadership development. The members of AMGA deliver health care to more than 80 million patients in 47 states, including 15 million capitated lives. The average AMGA member group has 275 physicians and 18 satellite locations. Headquartered in Alexandria, Virginia, AMGA is the strategic partner for medical groups, providing a comprehensive package of benefits including political advocacy, educational and networking programs, publications, benchmarking data services, and financial and operations assistance. The American Medical Group Foundation is the philanthropic arm of the AMGA. As a nonprofit 501(C)(3) organization, its mission is to foster quality improvement in group practice through education and research programs in clinical quality, patient safety, service, operational efficiency and innovation. For more information, visit http://www.amga.org.
RSS