Advancing Excellence is a coalition-based campaign to improve quality of care for the nation’s 1.5 million nursing facility residents.
At the national level, 28 diverse organizations joined together in 2006 to establish local quality improvement networks, track key quality indicators, promote caregiving excellence, and recognize the critical role of staff in providing resident-centered care.
In Massachusetts, 67% of the state’s nursing facilities have signed on to the campaign, the ninth highest level of participation in the country. Each facility has agreed to pursue and track at least three quality improvement goals, including at least one clinical and one organizational goal.
The Massachusetts Senior Care Foundation has taken a lead role in the Advancing Excellence campaign. In addition to encouraging participation and monitoring progress among Massachusetts providers, the Foundation led a study that examined why nursing facilities that signed on to the campaign did or did not enter self-reported quality improvement data on the national website.
The study found that communication was a major barrier. Facility staff who signed up for the campaign did not always communicate about the need to report quality improvement data. As a result, a system of email reminders has been recommended to ensure more consistent reporting of quality improvement results nationwide.
While progress in meeting the campaign’s goals is still being measured, initial results show that participating facilities have improved at a faster rate than non-participants on all of their chosen clinical and organizational goals. Facilities that set specific targets made even greater progress.
For 2009, the Advancing Excellence Goals Task Force has recommended enhancements to the campaign’s original goals, including a set of specific national, state and facility targets.
Massachusetts nursing facilities that have not yet signed up for the Advancing Excellence campaign are encouraged to do so by contacting Mass Senior Care's Helen Magliozzi.