Background: Georgetown professor Cal Newport coined the term “deep work” to describe the type of focus that allows high performance on cognitively demanding tasks that is only possible when one is free from distraction. High levels of attention and focus have been tied to increased creativity, improved work satisfaction, and higher quality of work. Some […]

Background: United States Preventive Services Task Force recommends clinicians provide smoking cessation counseling and interventions to all smokers and lung cancer screening with low dose CT scan for high-risk individuals. We aimed to determine the prevalence of smoking cessation counseling and lung cancer screening rate at the residents’ clinic and implement a multimodal plan to […]

Background: Quality Improvement (QI) is a methodology for solving complex systems problems, and QI methods have been adapted from industry and spread widely across healthcare over the past two decades. QI methods are particularly well-suited for examining clinical processes for effectiveness, reliability, and efficiency. However, Design Thinking (DT) is a problem solving methodology that applies […]

Background: Readmissions are costly to the healthcare system have been associated with low patient satisfaction scores, longer length of stay, and higher mortality. Identifying and addressing patient needs at the time of transitioning care from the inpatient to outpatient setting has the potential to reduce readmission rates. The purpose of our project was to develop […]

Background: Rapid response teams (RRT) are critical to the timely and appropriate management of acutely decompensating patients within many hospital systems. In the academic setting, the vital role of RRT leader is often filled by a resident physician who may lack the necessary medical knowledge and experience to initiate timely management for these patients. 100% […]

Background: Catheter Associated Urinary Tract Infections (CAUTI) and Central Line Associated Bloodstream Infections (CLABSI) carry a huge health care burden and is associated with increased length of stay and potential harm for the patient. There is an estimated total healthcare cost of $896 per infection for CAUTI and $45,814 per infection associated with CLABSI. The […]

Background: The use of metered-dose inhalers (MDIs) with spacers for delivering bronchodilator therapy is established as equivalent to the use of nebulizers (nebs) for symptom response.[1-3] Additional well-documented benefits to using MDIs in place of nebs include fewer systemic side effects, better long-term patient adherence to therapy, and, in the era of COVID-19, decreased use […]

Background: Provider-level practice variation is common and may impact clinical outcomes, such as length of stay and imaging ordering. However, it is unclear which provider characteristics lead to variations in practice. Using individual performance data from a provider-level dashboard, we aimed to evaluate variability in clinical performance and predictors of high or low performance. Methods: […]

Background: In 2017, Emory University Hospital Midtown (EUHM) instituted fast track dialysis (FTD) which identified low risk patients in the emergency department (ED) in need of hemodialysis (HD) and provided it efficiently. The FTD development team consisted of hospital medicine, emergency medicine, nephrology, dialysis unit nursing, and ED nursing. This program showed a reduction in […]

Background: A robust QI curriculum provides residents with the knowledge of QI methodologies and allows them to participate in a longitudinal QI initiative, demonstrating the skills required to implement, analyze, and present a full PDSA cycle. Limitations to having all residents in a training program be meaningful participants in ambitious QI projects are in large […]