Latest news with #qualityimprovement
Associated Press
04-08-2025
- Health
- Associated Press
Waymark Signal Achieves 85% Accuracy in Predicting Medicaid Care Gaps, Study in npj Digital Medicine Shows
Peer-reviewed research demonstrates dramatic improvement in identifying and closing quality gaps for Medicaid patients, outperforming current methods by 35 percentage points SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA / ACCESS Newswire / August 4, 2025 / Healthcare organizations nationwide face a critical challenge: how to effectively deploy limited staff to close quality measure gaps among patients receiving Medicaid. With health plans facing financial penalties for poor quality performance and providers under value-based contracts unable to reach vulnerable patients through traditional methods, many resort to ineffective and untargeted mass outreach campaigns - helping fewer than 8% of eligible patients. A new peer-reviewed study from Waymark published in Nature's npj Digital Medicine offers a solution. Signal for Quality Improvement, the company's newest predictive analytics technology, identifies with 85% accuracy which Medicaid patients will benefit most from proactive community-based outreach-enabling care teams to prioritize and target patients who need additional support to close gaps in care and improve quality performance. 'Healthcare organizations know that community-based outreach works, but they've been unable to identify and prioritize who will benefit most from these limited resources,' said Dr. Sadiq Y. Patel, lead author of the study and Vice President of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence (AI) for Waymark. 'The challenge isn't just identifying patients with open gaps-it's distinguishing between those who will close gaps on their own versus those who need proactive outreach and support. By incorporating social determinants of health data alongside clinical factors, Signal for Quality Improvement enables care teams to more efficiently prioritize outreach to the patients who need it most.' The study analyzed data from over 14 million Medicaid beneficiaries across 25 states and Washington D.C.. Researchers found that Signal for Quality Improvement achieved 85% accuracy in predicting which patients would miss nine nationally adopted quality measures, as defined by the Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set (HEDIS) developed by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA). Model simulations showed that using this predictive prioritization to guide outreach would result in a 35 percentage point improvement in helping patients close care gaps compared to traditional, non-predictive methods used by most healthcare organizations, such as alphabetical calling or birthday reminders. Signal for Quality Improvement is the latest addition to the company's proprietary Waymark SignalTM platform, which also includes Signal for Rising Risk. A 2024 peer-reviewed study published in Nature Scientific Reports demonstrated that Signal for Rising Risk predicts patients at risk for future avoidable emergency department (ED) and hospital visits with greater than 90% accuracy. Signal for Quality Improvement builds on this technology by enabling health plans and providers to identify which patients will most benefit from proactive outreach to close quality gaps and improve HEDIS performance. 'Healthcare organizations face significant financial penalties when quality metrics are poor, but current outreach methods are remarkably inefficient,' said Dr. Sanjay Basu, Co-founder and Head of Clinical at Waymark and senior author of the study. 'Signal for Quality Improvement represents a fundamental shift toward evidence-based patient outreach that can improve both health outcomes and resource allocation for the 80 million Americans covered by Medicaid.' The study found that incorporating social determinants of health data not only improved predictive accuracy, but also eliminated pre-existing racial disparities in prediction performance between Black and White patients across four quality measures. 'This paper addresses a persistent challenge in healthcare: efficiently reaching patients who need care most,' said Dr. Michael L. Barnett, study co-author and Professor at Brown School of Public Health. 'The combination of high predictive accuracy with a thoughtful approach that minimized racial bias offers a pathway toward more equitable healthcare delivery.' Waymark works with health plans and primary care providers to deliver community-based early interventions to patients receiving Medicaid. The company's local care teams use the Waymark Signal platform to identify and support patients who are at risk of avoidable ED and hospital visits or have open gaps in care. A 2024 peer-reviewed study published in NEJM Catalyst found that Waymark reduced all-cause hospital and ED visits by 22.5% for rising risk patients, and improved care quality by an average of 11.8 absolute percentage points across seven quality measures in its first year of service. The full article titled " Predicting Quality Measure Completion Among 14 Million Low-Income Patients Enrolled in Medicaid " was published in npj Digital Medicine, a peer-reviewed journal published by Nature. The authors were Sadiq Y. Patel MSW PhD of Waymark, Michael L. Barnett MD of Brown School of Public Health, and Sanjay Basu MD PhD of Waymark. About Waymark Waymark is a public benefit company dedicated to improving access and quality of care for people receiving Medicaid. We partner with health plans and primary care providers-including health systems, federally qualified health centers (FQHCs), and independent practices-to provide community-based care to people enrolled in Medicaid. Our local teams of community health workers, pharmacists, therapists and care coordinators use proprietary data science technologies to deliver early interventions to hard-to-reach patient populations. Waymark's peer-reviewed research has been published in leading journals including the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) Catalyst, Nature Scientific Reports, and Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA)-demonstrating measurable improvements in health outcomes and cost savings for Medicaid populations. For more information, visit Contact Information Iman Rahim Communications [email protected] SOURCE: Waymark press release
Yahoo
12-07-2025
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Ford Says Its Quality Is Improving; Why Is This Number Going in the Wrong Direction?
Ford checked in just below industry average in J.D. Power's 2025 Initial Quality Study. The auto industry has gradually experienced more problems with new vehicles. Ford's quality improvement will take time to see as new vehicles replace old models. 10 stocks we like better than Ford Motor Company › One of the big knocks against Ford Motor Company (NYSE: F) over the past few years has been its recalls, and the sometimes higher warranty costs associated with them. When automakers such as Ford have a large recall, which sometimes requires customers to bring vehicles in for service, it can ring up a hefty bill on its financials. In the past, the warranty costs spiked enough to hinder the company's earnings. Ford's stance has been that it's made substantial improvements on quality, but if that's the case, why isn't it scoring better in J.D. Power's 2025 Initial Quality Study? Let's dig in. J.D. Power's Initial Quality Study (IQS) is in its 39th year and collects responses from over 90,000 customers of 2025 new vehicle models, who were then surveyed after 90 days of ownership. The study's goal is to gauge how many problems per 100 vehicles, sorted by brand. It's a simple way to evaluate the quality of new vehicles, with the lower the score, the better. And this year's winner is, drum roll: Lexus (owned by Toyota)! Lexus was the highest-ranking brand overall in the study, with a score of 166 PP100. For premium brands, Lexus was followed by Jaguar and Genesis, with respective scores of 175 PP100 and 183 PP100. For mass-market brands, Nissan might have shocked a few investors in ranking highest, or scoring lowest, at 169 PP100. Hyundai and Chevrolet (part of General Motors) rounded out the top three for mass-market brands with scores of 173 PP100 and 178 PP100, respectively. Now, gathering all of a parent company's brands under their respective umbrellas -- for example, General Motors owns brands Cadillac, Chevrolet, Buick, and GMC -- the OEM with the most model-level awards was GM with five, followed by Ford with four, and Honda with three. Now let's take a closer look at Ford and see if we can extrapolate any IQS data for perhaps a preview of future issues and potential recalls. As you probably noted in the graphic, Ford checked in just below industry average. That's respectable and raises no red flags, but it's worth glancing through some history to better understand trends. Ford's score of 193 PP100 in 2025 was noticeably worse than last year's score of 178 PP100, which was good enough to rank in the top third of all brands. Taking it a little bit further, let's rewind the clock to 2020, when Ford scored an even better 174 PP100. In 2015, Ford scored a far better 107 PP100. This brings up an important question: Is Ford's vehicle quality really improving? And if it isn't, should investors expect rising warranty costs and hindered earnings? Not so fast! There are a couple of important factors to consider before jumping to conclusions regarding Ford's trending scores. First, the industry average has moved in similar a similar trend line. That's because over the past decade, vehicles have grown far more complex in terms of innovation, driver assistance systems, and infotainment services, among others. As those new technologies debut, rarely does it happen without initial problems that eventually get worked out over time. Second, we also have to consider the severity of these problems. J.D. Power noted that the infotainment category remains the most problematic vehicle category. In fact, half of the top problems industrywide remain infotainment issues. Another consumer issue: cupholder size. That's right, one of the biggest and most reoccurring complaints is that the size of cupholders often doesn't fit reusable containers. Ford won't miss earnings this quarter because of infotainment system or cupholder size recalls. The J.D. Power study scores aren't likely correlated to recalls, or accompanying warranty costs, because it's looking for initial problems within the first 90 days -- not a time frame there's likely to be a major repair/recall needed. Does this study have value? Absolutely. It's a wonderful resource to gauge consumer feedback on new vehicle models that will become the bloodline of automakers. But can we take Ford's worsening scores to mean that its vehicle quality isn't improving, at least the important things (looking at you, cupholders)? No, not in my opinion. It takes time for Ford's more recent push on quality to work through the process, and for newer cars to replace older, more problematic models. At the end of the day, while investors would love to see Ford improve year after year and even overtake Lexus at the top, these scores don't raise any real red flags when it comes to potential recalls or potential earnings hits. Before you buy stock in Ford Motor Company, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Ford Motor Company wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $674,432!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $1,005,854!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 1,049% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 180% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join . See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of July 7, 2025 Daniel Miller has positions in Ford Motor Company and General Motors. The Motley Fool recommends General Motors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. Ford Says Its Quality Is Improving; Why Is This Number Going in the Wrong Direction? was originally published by The Motley Fool
Medscape
05-06-2025
- Business
- Medscape
GLP-1 Users Should Fast 24 Hours Before Anesthesia
Patients taking the new class of weight-loss drugs do not need to stop these medications prior to procedures requiring anesthesia, but they should adhere to longer preoperative fasting times, according to a new multidisciplinary consensus statement. The statement, led by the Society for Perioperative Assessment and Quality Improvement, recommends patients without significant gastrointestinal symptoms associated with glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonists (GLP-1 RAs) should fast from solid foods for 24 hours and stick to clear liquids prior to a procedure requiring anesthesia. This extended fasting time can help mitigate aspiration risk in these patients with delayed gastric emptying while retaining the benefits of continuing GLP-1 RAs, such as improved glycemic control. The statement is 'the first to provide recommendations for perioperative management of patients taking GLP-1 RAs based on an in-depth systematic literature review of both clinical perioperative studies and gastric emptying data,' Adriana Oprea, MD, the first author of the document, and her colleagues wrote. Changing Guidance In June 2023, the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) released the first guidance statement regarding preoperative management of patients on GLP-1 RAs, after some case reports documented aspiration events in these patients. While the number of these events is generally low and rates of aspiration appear to be similar between patients on GLP-1 RAs and the general population, 'people got really worried with these drugs because of [the] delayed gastric emptying,' Oprea, an associate professor of anesthesiology at Yale School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut, told Medscape Medical News . The 2023 ASA guidance recommended holding GLP-1 RAs for one half-life — a week for patients on long-acting medication and a day for short-acting GLP-1s. Due to a lack of adequate evidence at the time, the document suggested these patients should follow the standard ASA fasting guidelines of 8 hours after a full meal. However, evidence suggests stopping GLP-1s for one half-life is not enough for the effects on gastric emptying to subside, according to the new statement. For longer-acting drugs like dulaglutide, semaglutide, and tirzepatide, patients would need to discontinue these medications for several weeks to restore normal gastrointestinal motility. For patients with type 2 diabetes, discontinuation of these medications over this period could lead to poor glycemic control, which is linked to worse postoperative outcomes. For patients taking GLP-1 RAs for weight loss, restarting these medications can result in increased gastrointestinal symptoms, Oprea said, such as nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, or constipation. 'Because adverse effects are more prevalent at higher GLP-1 RA doses, discontinuation of these medications might lead to a high likelihood of side effects upon medication reinitiation or require reinitiation of therapy at lower doses followed by dose reescalation,' Oprea's group wrote. 'This is logistically difficult for both patients and treating clinicians.' In October 2024, the ASA, along with other professional societies, published updated practice guidance stating GLP-1 RAs may be continued preoperatively in patients without an elevated risk for delayed gastric emptying and aspiration. Those defined as 'higher risk' included patients in the escalation phase, on weekly dosing, on higher doses, and with gastrointestinal symptoms. The guidance advised these patients at higher risk for delayed stomach emptying can help mitigate aspiration risk by following a 24-hour liquid diet. This updated guidance also received some criticism. 'As of yet, no studies have reported a difference in the incidence of increased residual gastric content that would justify treating patients differently on the basis of dose regimen and/or treatment phase,' wrote Glenio B. Mizubuti, MD, PhD, of the Kingston General Hospital, in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, and his colleagues in a letter to Anesthesiology . 'Similarly, the absence of ongoing digestive symptoms, while somewhat reassuring, should not be taken as a definitive sign of an empty stomach in GLP-1 RA users,' they wrote. Continue Meds, Extend Fasting Times This new consensus statement, published last month in the British Journal of Anaesthesia , recommends patients doing well on GLP-1 RAs should continue these medications preoperatively and follow a clear liquid diet for 24 hours before procedures requiring anesthesia. The recommendations were based on a systematic review of 112 studies and a modified Delphi process and were co-sponsored and endorsed by the American Association of Clinical Endocrinology. 'From our review of the literature, we feel that the fasting times are the most important factor that could decrease the risk of having residual gastric content in the stomach in a patient on GLP-1 RAs when they're scheduled to have a procedure that requires anesthesia,' Oprea said. The consensus also recommends patients on GLP-1s fast from high-carbohydrate-content clear liquids (containing 10% or more glucose) for 8 hours before and stop drinking any liquids four hours before these procedures. Inpatient and outpatients can restart GLP-1 RAs when they resume their original diets. Patients with significant gastrointestinal symptoms including severe nausea, vomiting, and inability to tolerate oral intake should postpone elective procedures that require anesthesia and refer to their prescribing physician for diet and medication modifications to manage symptoms, the authors advised. 'Our recommendation for a clear liquid diet for 24 hours preprocedurally might appear overly restrictive. However, evidence points to the safety of this approach in patients on GLP-1 RAs,' they wrote.
Medscape
02-06-2025
- General
- Medscape
Cefazolin in Joint Surgery Safe Despite Antibiotic Allergy
For patients with beta-lactam allergy undergoing orthopedic surgery, prioritizing cefazolin as the preferred antibiotic for the prevention of surgical site infections (SSIs) did not lead to any probable hypersensitivity reactions, even among patients with a history of severe beta-lactam allergies. METHODOLOGY: Past practice had called for avoiding the use of cefazolin in patients with beta-lactam allergy, but this approach left patients at greater risk for SSIs. Newer studies established that cefazolin could be a safe option for these patients after all. Researchers conducted a retrospective review to evaluate the safety of a quality improvement protocol that recommended adopting cefazolin for SSI prophylaxis in patients allergic to beta-lactams — excluding those with a documented allergy to cefazolin. The analysis included 521 patients (average age, 58 years; 67.56% women) with a documented penicillin or cephalosporin allergy who underwent an elective orthopedic surgery. All the patients received a weight-based cefazolin dose within 60 minutes of incision, which was repeated every 8 hours postoperatively until discharge or to a maximum of three doses. TAKEAWAY: None of the patients met the criteria for probable intraoperative hypersensitivity reactions. Twenty-four patients experienced intraoperative hemodynamic instability within 5 minutes of receiving the drug, but 14 of these patients received subsequent doses and did not experience further hemodynamic changes. The other 10 patients did not receive additional doses. No patient required intraoperative epinephrine or diphenhydramine or was labeled as allergic to cefazolin. IN PRACTICE: 'We recommend adopting cefazolin as the standard of care for SSI prophylaxis in orthopedic surgeries, regardless of beta-lactam allergy history or severity, while excluding only those who had a documented cefazolin-specific allergy,' the authors wrote. SOURCE: Zachary Clarke, MD, with the Anderson Orthopaedic Research Institute in Alexandria, Virginia, was the first author of the study, which was published online on May 22 in The Journal of Arthroplasty. LIMITATIONS: The limitations of the study were retrospective study design and the simultaneous use of other medications that can cause hypotension, the researchers noted. Future studies could validate the findings and consider other types of surgery, they wrote. DISCLOSURES: The authors reported having no conflicts of interest.
LBCI
30-05-2025
- Business
- LBCI
Can Lebanon turn olives into economic gold? Sector needs urgent reform
Report by Theresia Rahme, English Adaptation by Karine Keuchkerian Out of 169,000 farmers in Lebanon, 110,000 grow olives. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, the sector supports over 500 olive presses and 160 olive oil facilities. These numbers could increase—and benefit Lebanon more—if producers focus on improving quality. That is precisely what the Agriculture Ministry is working on through training workshops aimed at upgrading farmers' skills and boosting production standards, helping Lebanese olive oil compete globally. The main focus is the U.S. market, Lebanon's top olive oil importer, with exports valued at $7.3 million, followed by Canada and Qatar. That figure could rise further if Lebanon fully complies with U.S. quality standards. But can Lebanon scale up exports? The sector faces challenges. Production varies year to year; about 50% of olive trees are aging, farms are small, and agricultural methods remain largely traditional. The Agriculture Ministry has a plan to strengthen the sector, but it needs to act quickly to implement it, improve quality, increase output, and meet the expectations of international buyers.
