MACKINAC ISLAND, MI – Beaumont Health System has been selected to join a prestigious national collaborative of health systems designed to improve health care quality, lower costs and expand best care practices to other health providers.

Beaumont President and CEO Gene Michalski announced the health system's entry into the High Value Healthcare Collaborative at the Detroit Regional Chamber Mackinac Policy Conference.

The Collaborative was launched in December 2010 by the Mayo Clinic, Denver Health, Geisinger Health System, Intermountain Healthcare, Dartmouth-Hitchcock, Cleveland Clinic and The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice.

Beaumont is one of eight health systems and the only Michigan health system just added to the Collaborative.

In signing on, Baylor Health Care System, Beaumont Health System, MaineHealth, Scott & White Health Care, Sutter Health, UCLA Health System, University of Iowa Health Care, and Virginia Mason Medical Center demonstrate their commitment to sharing care pathways, cost and outcomes data with their partners and the public as they adopt best practices and new standards of measurement.

"To be selected to participate with this group is a huge honor for our health system," says Michalski. "It recognizes our national leadership for high quality, cost-effective care, and will allow us to further improve our performance by benchmarking with and learning from other leading health systems."

"This collaborative is wonderful news for Michigan," said Governor Rick Snyder. "We have some of the best hospitals in the country right here in Michigan and innovative solutions like those developed and shared by Beaumont through this Collaborative will give Michigan residents even greater access to outstanding health care."

The new partner and affiliate members were selected by the founding Collaborative group based on a nomination and review process. Criteria included having strong research and quality improvement processes, a robust health information technology infrastructure, a commitment of personnel, operational and financial resources, and demonstrated experience in collaboration across institutions. The new members will be assimilated into the Collaborative over the next several months.

"We believe that physicians and health care leaders are in a key position to implement meaningful change that makes care safer, more efficient, more effective and more attuned to each patient's needs and preferences," says Dr. James N. Weinstein, director of The Dartmouth Institute and president of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Clinic. "At the same time, based on our research and individual experience, we know that by doing this, we actually lower costs."

Currently, the Collaborative is working together in nine increasingly prevalent condition/disease-specific areas that have been shown nationally to have wide variation in rates, costs and outcomes. These are: total knee replacement; diabetes; asthma; hip surgery; heart failure; perinatal care; depression; spine surgery; and weight loss surgery.  Additional high variation, high cost conditions that affect diverse populations will be added over time.

Beaumont Health System is a three-hospital regional health care system with a total of 1,744 licensed beds, more than 14,000 full-time equivalent employees and 3,700 physicians in Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties. In addition to its hospitals, Beaumont operates numerous community-based medical centers in Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties, family practice and internal medicine practices in Macomb and Wayne counties, five nursing centers, a research institute, home care services and hospice. All three Beaumont hospitals are among the Detroit metro area's top-ranked hospitals by U.S. News & World Report with Beaumont, Royal Oak ranking first. Beaumont is the exclusive clinical teaching site for the new Oakland University William Beaumont School of Medicine that welcomes its charter class on August 8, 2011. Visit Beaumont on the Web at www.beaumont.edu.

Read more: http://www.sacbee.com/2011/06/01/3669526/beaumont-health-system-one-of.html#ixzz1O7uGEtUv