How Do We Advance Quality Care Delivery: The Role of a Center of Excellence-How Do We Advance Quality Care Delivery: The Role of a Center of Excellence

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Video Summary

The session focused on advancing the quality of care delivery and the role of centers of excellence, specifically for atrial fibrillation (AFib) management. Dr. Silverstein provided insights from his experiences in various healthcare models and discussed a document outlining criteria for establishing AFib centers of excellence, which is valuable for standardizing care and improving patient outcomes. The document aims to empower various healthcare practices, ensuring inclusivity across different settings and encouraging all institutions to strive for excellence in AFib care.<br /><br />Panelists highlighted the importance of multidisciplinary collaboration, standardized protocols, continuous quality improvement, and patient-centered approaches as characteristics defining a center of excellence. Allied professionals emphasized utilizing versatile care models, virtual healthcare components, and robust patient education to enhance service delivery. The inclusion of a dedicated AFib clinic and integration of allied health professionals were noted as effective strategies for reducing care delivery fragmentation and optimizing patient access to electrophysiology expertise.<br /><br />Additionally, clinical registries like the Get With The Guidelines AFib program were emphasized for their role in improving adherence to anticoagulation guidelines, providing real-world data, and supporting quality improvement through comprehensive data collection. International perspectives emphasized the certification of centers of excellence based on minimum procedure volume and the need for a focus on procedural excellence while maintaining safety standards.<br /><br />From a vascular neurology standpoint, collaboration with cardiologists was advocated for improved detection of hidden AFib in stroke patients and optimizing treatment plans to mitigate recurrent strokes. The session concluded by encouraging the use of resources such as CardiQ.org to aid in the development of specialty clinics and highlighted the importance of tailoring data collection strategies to meet institutional goals for patient care improvement.

Keywords

quality of care

centers of excellence

atrial fibrillation

multidisciplinary collaboration

standardized protocols

patient-centered care

AFib management

clinical registries

anticoagulation guidelines

virtual healthcare