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QCMetrix provides the information technology infrastructure and manage-
ment advisory services to collect and analyze surgical process and outcomes data and then present it back to practitioners to improve the quality of care and lower healthcare costs.
QCMetrix supports the day-to-day operations of the Blue Cross/Blue Shield Funded Michigan Surgical Quality Collaborative (MSQC).
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Since 2006, the Michigan Surgical Quality Collaborative, historically based upon the National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP) at its core, has demonstrated that the systematic collection, analysis and feedback of risk-adjusted surgical data leads to improved patient outcomes. MSQC has also demonstrated that regional collaboration can significantly increase surgical quality improvement, over and above what can be achieved by national programs.
History: VA and Private Sector
Between 1991 and 2001, the Veterans Administration's VA NSQIP demonstrated system-wide, across 128 medical centers, a 27% decrease in the 30-day postoperative mortality rate. Lengths of stay resulting from morbidities declined by 45% in that period.
A 1999 pilot study at three non-VA medical centers substantiated the risk-adjustment and predictive outcome models of the VA NSQIP, as well as its positive impact on the quality of surgical care. But something else was discovered during the pilot: whereas the VA hospitals shared a uniform and fully electronic IT infrastructure at its 128 medical centers, the systems in the private sector varied dramatically.
Hospitals today are sitting on oceans of data. And these data, unfortunately, live in legacy systems commonly designed around a single purpose. The applications lack compatibility, so there’s little integration or data sharing across the hospital. Information gets entered multiple times and often on paper. Items that should be stored as discrete variables get lumped together in a single field, limiting effective query and analysis.
A Common Infrastructure
The principals of QCMetrix, with tens of years of combined experience at the VA and in the VA NSQIP, knew first-hand the system struggles experienced in these hospitals. They proposed to the VA’s Private Sector Initiative to design and support a reliable, flexible and scalable informatics infrastructure. Their design would accommodate evolving program requirements and protocols and would work equally well in hospitals across a spectrum of information systems, procedures and cultures.
In 2001, QCMetrix designed , proposed, and developed the Web-based platform for the VA’s “Private Sector Initiative.” QCMetrix continued to refine and extend this platform for the American College of Surgeons (ACS) under a three-year AHRQ-funded grant. In August of 2004, at the expiration of the AHRQ grant, the ACS took on formal leadership of the Program in the private sector, and has stewarded the expansion of the ACS NSQIP nationally. QCMetrix provided the information technology and day-to-day management infrastructure for the program during 2004-2010.
QCMetrix provided an electronic interface to enable automatic transfer of data from hospital systems directly to the program's central web server. QCMetrix developed and provided other productivity tools to facilitate not only the mechanics of data collection, but also to support process management and decision-making.
MSQC
QCMetrix has built additional information technology facilities to power the Michigan Surgical Quality Collaborative (MSQC), and serves over 50 private-sector medical centers in Michigan.