Heterogeneity in Surgical Quality Improvement in Michigan
Alisha Lussiez1,2, Ryan Eton1,2, Maia Anderson1,2
1Department of Surgery, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI.
Objective:
The aim of this study was to evaluate changes in 30-day postoperative outcomes and individual hospital variation in outcomes from 2012 to 2019 in a collaborative quality improvement network.
Summary Background Data:
Collaborative quality improvement efforts have been shown to improve postoperative outcomes overall; however, heterogeneity in improvement between participating hospitals remains unclear. Understanding the distribution of individual hospital-level changes is necessary to inform resource allocation and policy design.
Methods:
We performed a retrospective cohort study of 51 hospitals in the Michigan Surgical Quality Collaborative (MSQC) from 2012 to 2019. Risk-and reliability-adjusted hospital rates of 30-day mortality, complications, serious complications, emergency department (ED) visits, readmissions, and reoperations were calculated for each year and compared between the last 2 years and the first 2 years of the study period.
Results:
There was a significant decrease in the rates of all 5 adverse outcomes across MSQC hospitals from 2012 to 2019. Of the 51 individual hospitals, 31 (61%) hospitals achieved a decrease in mortality (range -1.3 percentage points to +0.6 percentage points), 40 (78%) achieved a decrease in complications (range -8.5 percentage points to +2.9 percentage points), 26 (51%) achieved a decrease in serious complications (range -3.2 percentage points to +3.0 percentage points), 29 (57%) achieved a decrease in ED visits (range 5.0 percentage points to +2.2 percentage points), 46 (90%) achieved a decrease in readmissions (range -3.1 percentage points to +0.4 percentage points) and 39 (76%) achieved a decrease in reoperations (range 3.3 percentage points to +1.0 percentage points).
Conclusions:
Despite overall improvement in surgical outcomes across hospitals participating in a quality improvement collaborative, there was substantial variation in improvement between hospitals, highlighting opportunities to better understand hospital-level barriers and facilitators to surgical quality improvement.
