Bridging the Gap: Reimagining Quality Improvement to Address Healthcare Disparities

Bundles and collaboratives show promise for reducing maternal morbidity and narrowing racial disparities, but only when equity is intentionally embedded throughout design and implementation. Data disaggregation of baseline process and outcome measures by race, ethnicity, and language can identify disparities and be used to target interventions at known and/or suspected inequities driving the disparities. Several national frameworks exist, and successful reduction of racial and ethnic disparities has been achieved through perinatal quality collaborative-facilitated statewide implementation of patient safety bundles with an equity focus.