James M Anderson Center for Health Systems Excellence

Improvement Science Education

ImpactU

ImpactU is a six-month course designed to provide community leaders and partners with an in-depth understanding of Improvement Science while fostering cross-sector relationships. The course, created specifically for community leaders and partners by Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center (CCHMC) in 2015, has been used to train hundreds of improvement leaders.

ImpactU is offered by invitation once per year to key partners in the community. ImpactU inspires social service agency, school, government, and healthcare organization members to equitably apply Quality Improvement (QI) tools, processes, and knowledge to change the lives of children and families in the greater Cincinnati and Hamilton County area.

As a result of participating in ImpactU, attendees will be able to:

1. Utilize Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Improvement Science Model to demonstrate measurable improvement on a narrowly scoped project in their department or organization aligned with organizational goals and with All Children Thrive (ACT) Theme Areas described below:
   
   Excellent and Equitable Health Outcomes: Ensure delivery of equitable care working in partnership with families and community partners and strengthen health-related wraparound supports to achieve excellent outcomes for children and families
   
   Safe and Supported Families: Activate and integrate family voice in the community, prevent and mitigate adversities for children and families in our community including practice and policy changes, and improve access to evidence-based trauma prevention and intervention services
   
   Path to Full Potential: Optimize each child’s development and academic, social and job readiness across their life trajectory through high quality early childhood education, home, and community-based supports that include equipping schools with necessities to enable learning
   
   
2. Lead a team to generate meaningful change on a specific project by utilizing QI tools to: Plan a project, understand the current state, develop goals, design tests of change, implement changes, and leverage learnings to sustain improvements.
3. Continue to use the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Improvement Science Model within your organization and support others launching improvement initiatives.
4. Leverage relationships formed with other community participants to collaborate on improvement projects across systems to change outcomes for children and families in the Cincinnati area.

• A six-month, hands-on, course
• One or two full day sessions each month from October to April, and a Re-Connect session 4 months after graduation and a few hours per week between each session to work on selected improvement project
• Instructional methodologies include lectures, large and small group discussions, application exercises, project presentations, and interactive learning while utilizing an “All Teach, All Learn” environment
• Collaboration with multisector partners working together to ensure that children and families thrive

Rapid Cycle Improvement Collaborative (RCIC)

Aimed at small teams who are recommended and sponsored by their leadership. RCIC is designed to achieve a measurable improvement in a focused, narrow-scoped project in 120 days by a team. The RCIC develops the team leader's ability to lead a narrow-scoped improvement project using the Model for Improvement and builds team members' capability in using the model and basic QI tools.

>See course brochure.

• For entire team including leaders; approximately six half-day sessions

• Team leaders only; in addition to the six half-day sessions with the team, there is a one-day orientation on leading teams and an additional four half days of training

• Sessions include instruction, application examples and time to work on team project

Lean Collaborative 

The Lean Collaborative is an eight-week, hands-on, team-based course designed to deepen participants' ability to solve problems and improve operational performance. The course, created by our hospital and facilitated by the Anderson Center's Leadership Academy, is based on the lean tools and methods utilized in the Toyota Production System (TPS) and top performing healthcare organizations to identify non-value added work and lead improvements in safety, quality, productivity, lead time, cost effectiveness, and staff burden.

The Lean Collaborative is offered quarterly to Cincinnati Children's employees and, by invitation only, to key partners in the community who are committed to driving change that eliminates non-value added work and improves customer satisfaction. Attendees include top management, middle managers, frontline staff and leaders in clinical and / or administrative areas.

Participants will learn the history and philosophy of lean and how to adopt the tools/methods in their setting. They will use a combination of classroom exercises and a team-based project to demonstrate a basic understanding of:

• Process observation and identification of non-value added work
• Visualization of material, people, and information flow in a value stream map
• Standardization, work measurement and "5S"activities
• Problem solving and PDSA improvement cycles
• Project summarization using A3 (1-page) reporting

There is a fee for participating in this course.

For more information, email us at lean_collaborative@cchmc.org

• An eight-week, hands-on course
• Six half day(s) of training and approximately two to four hours per week outside of the class to work on selected project
• Hands-on, team-based learning and one-on-one coaching
• Connections with peers from multi-sector work

Intermediate Improvement Science Series (I2S2)

Cincinnati Children's employees: Course is intended for leaders including physicians, nurses, allied health and nonclinical leaders, at the director level or above. Your supervisor will nominate you for the course.

Leaders outside of Cincinnati Children's: We welcome leaders from other healthcare systems to apply for the Intermediate Improvement Science Series (I2S2). Learn more about how the program would benefit you.

The aim of I2S2 is to build a broader and deeper network of improvement leaders, bring about continued cultural transformation and develop skill and experience with all aspects of Deming's System of Profound Knowledge. It includes understanding variation, appreciation of the system, theory of knowledge / action-learning and psychology / change management.

> See course brochure.

> See an I2S2 key driver diagram.

• Seven on- and off-site sessions over a six-month period

• Work on a project between sessions with a coach

• Extensive readings

• Issues in healthcare quality including the business case for quality

• Systems thinking, understanding variation, the model for improvement, leading change

• QI tools and methods

• Chronic care improvement

• Patient safety and reliability science

Advanced Improvement Methods (AIM)

Advanced Improvement Methods (AIM) is a highly interactive course for faculty who lead improvement projects and already know the basics of QI and clinical epidemiology and/or research methods. 

Through brief didactic sessions, case studies, simulation exercises and projects, participants will:

• Enhance knowledge and skills to apply the science of improvement to the design, implementation and study of quality improvement initiatives in clinical settings
• Apply improvement theory and methods to the leadership of projects involving research, clinical care and operations

• Four two-day sessions

• Six 90-minute webinars

• Work on project and readings between sessions

• Lecture, case studies, simulation exercises

Cincinnati Children's faculty and faculty from other academic medical centers.

Learn more about how the program would benefit you and find an application for admission that includes information about 2020-2021 dates for workshops and conference calls, application deadline and fees, expectations of participants, selection criteria and our faculty.

> See course brochure.