Hospitals, on average, save $1,763 per admission, have fewer patient complications, and a decreased length of stay after implementing programs based on 12 standards outlined by the American College of Surgeons.
Researchers from the American College of Surgeons released the third part in a series of evaluations on the effectiveness of the organization's 12 standards outlined in its Quality Verification Program. The results were published July 9 in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons.
They focused on reviewing 150 studies that focused on one of three things: standardized team-based care across five phases of surgical care, disease-based management, and external regulatory review. The analysis revealed that hospitals adhering to these standards saw decreased length of stay by about 1.9 days and also reduced hospital costs by $1,763 per admission.
"Because all hospitals are different, each is able to focus on individual priorities for improvement," Clifford Ko, MD, the director of ACS Quality Programs, said in a news release shared with Becker's. "What's clear is that QVP provides the roadmap and tools to make significant improvement, leading to better patient care and a more effective and efficient use of resources by a hospital."
The other two studies in the three part series looked at how hospitals can build quality and safety resources and infrastructure, and how to create processes for reliable quality improvement.