Brown-Spath and Associates

Patrice L. Spath

Patrice L. Spath, BA, RHIT, devotes the majority of her time to educating health care professionals in quality and resource management techniques. Since 1983 Patrice has authored several books and journal articles on patient safety, utilization management, performance improvement, staff development, and related topics. These were published by her own company, Brown-Spath & Associates, and for groups such as the American Hospital Association, Jossey-Bass, Health Administration Press, American Health Information Management Association, and OR Manager, Inc. She is also an assistant professor in the Department of Health Services Administration at the University of Alabama in Birmingham.

For Health Administration Press she authored the book, Leading your Healthcare Organization to Excellence: A Guide to Using the Baldrige Criteria (2005). For AHA Press and Jossey-Bass Publishers she has edited several books, including: Partnering with Patients to Reduce Medical Errors (2004); Guide to Effective Staff Development in Health Care Organizations (2002); Error Reduction in Health Care (2000), Provider Report Cards (1999), Beyond Clinical Paths: Advanced Tools for Outcomes Management (1997), Medical Effectiveness and Outcomes Management (1996), and Clinical Paths: Tools for Outcomes Management (1994). For Brown-Spath & Associates, Patrice has written several practical training manuals including: From Quality to Excellence: Using Comparative Data to Improve Healthcare Performance (2002); Measuring and Improving Continuity of Patient Care (2001); Patient Safety Improvement Guidebook (2000); How to Measure and Improve Case Management Performance (2000); Investigating Sentinel Events (1997); Performance Improvement in Psychiatric and Substance Abuse Treatment Services (1997), Mastering Path-Based Patient Care (1995), and AIMing for Quality Results: An Improvement Primer for Healthcare Organizations (1994). She is a regular columnist for Hospital Peer Review and Hospital Case Management.

In recognition of her many contributions, Patrice was awarded the 1990 Literary Award from the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA). In 1996, Patrice was recognized as an outstanding member of the Quality Management Section of the AHIMA and in 1998 she was the winner of the AHIMA Legacy Award Winner for her significant contributions to the knowledge base on the health information management field through articles, chapters, books, and presentations. For her literary contributions to the health care quality profession, in 2001 Patrice received the National Association for Healthcare Quality (NAHQ) Award for Excellence in Publication.

In 2006 Patrice was awarded the James A. Hamilton Book of the Year Award for her book, Leading Your Health Care Organization to Excellence. The James A. Hamilton Award is given annually to the author of a management or healthcare book judged outstanding by the American College of Healthcare Executive’s Book of the Year Committee.

Practical experience in quality assurance and utilization management was acquired during her seventeen years at Meridian Park Hospital in Tualatin, Oregon. After serving as assistant director of the Medical Record Department and Tumor Registrar, Patrice assumed the position of Review Coordinator where she designed and implemented hospitalwide quality assurance and utilization review programs.

During the past 25 years, Patrice has designed or participated in as faculty over 300 educational programs on health care quality management, utilization control and patient safety improvement topics. In addition she has completed a number of comprehensive evaluations of quality assurance/utilization review programs, overall quality management activities and clinical path initiatives for hospitals and managed care organizations; furnishing them invaluable feedback for system improvements.

Patrice has been the Treasurer of the National Association for Healthcare Quality and a member/ chairman of their Certification Board, last serving on the Certification Study Guide task force in 1998. From 1993-95, Patrice served as a regional councilor for the Health Care Division of the American Society for Quality. Patrice was very active in the Quality Management Section of the AHIMA, serving as Chair for three years and as editor for their bimonthly newsletter The Quality Resource. From 1996-98 she served on the AHIMA Council on Certification and from 1999-2001 served on the AHIMA Council on Accreditation. In 2002, Patrice was appointed to the audio-conference task group of the American Society for Healthcare Risk Management (ASHRM) and in 2003 served as chair of their JCAHO standards conference task force.

In early 1992 she was appointed to serve on a workgroup of the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research to assist in the development of a model for translating their clinical practice guidelines to medical review criteria, performance measures and standards of quality. This model was published in April 1995. In the summer of 1995, Patrice served on a Clinical Guidelines Panel sponsored by the Quality Management Institute and Education Center of the Department of Veterans Affairs. In 1997 Patrice served as member of the clinical path task group of the Association of Operating Room Nurses, Inc. This group designed a perioperative pathway template for use by surgery service managers. In August 1998, Patrice was asked to serve as an online "Expert" on outcomes management topics for the "Ask the Expert" feature of the Modern Healthcare Web site. In 2002, Patrice was invited to serve on the advisory board for WebM&W.This online case-based journal and forum on patient safety and healthcare quality is supported by a contract from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality(AHRQ). In 2002 Patrice was selected by the American College of Healthcare Executives to facilitate a series of cluster workshops on performance excellence in health care facilities.

Michelle H. Pelling, MBA, RN, is a healthcare management consultant with over ten years of experience assisting organizations throughout the U.S. and Canada. Michelle is principal of The Propell Group. This Oregon-based firm provides healthcare management consulting in the areas of continuous quality improvement, performance measurement, managed care, clinical pathways, work redesign, strategic planning, JCAHO survey preparation, team building, customer service, and organizational development. Michelle has been a member of the clinical faculty of the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations for more than ten years, is the principal speaker at state conferences and customized seminars; and teaches courses in Health Economics, Strategic Planning, Quality Improvement, Utilization Management, and Health Care Futures at colleges in the Portland, Oregon metropolitan area.

Duke Rohe has been involved in health care improvement for thirty years. He is an industrial engineer by degree and a creator by nature. Duke is a Fellow member of the Healthcare Information Management Systems Society and has received its Total Quality Management Award and its Outstanding Fellow Service Award. He authored the chapter `Instigating Change and Engaging Teams` in the society`s Management Engineering Handbook. Duke is currently a systems improvement specialist at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in the Texas Medical Center (Houston). He considers himself the improvement geek for accelerated change at the hospital. His creation of improvement tools began as a commitment to generate a tool a week and share it with change masters in his organization.

Michael E. Smith, MA, MA, is a private consultant, a senior member of the American Society for Quality (ASQ), a member of the ASQ Quality Management and Statistics Divisions, past chair of the Portland Oregon chapter of ASQ, a board member and secretary of the Oregon Quality Initiative, and an ASQ-certified quality auditor. Michael has taught statistics and experimental methodology at the graduate and undergraduate levels and assisted in the design and implementation of the Oregon Quality Award Program.

Aggie Stewart, MA, is a freelance writer, editor, and writing consultant with more than 13 years experience in health care publishing. Formerly Managing Editor for Accreditation Publications at the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO), Ms. Stewart led a number of important publications initiatives during her JCAHO tenure, notably creation of the Comprehensive Accreditation Manual for Hospitals (CAMH), Project Plain English, and development of the subscription-based CAMH. She was also closely involved with the editorial development of the function-based accreditation standards. She currently runs Stewart Publication Services, a full service editorial firm based in Rhode Island, and writes on a range of health care quality and information management topics.

Paula S. Swain, RN, MSN, CPHQ, has a diverse background in consulting, education, health care administration, and quality management. Paula is president of Swain & Associates, a training/consulting firm in Charlotte, NC. She is nationally certified as a professional in healthcare quality (CPHQ), a fellow in the National Association of Healthcare Quality, and a licensed healthcare risk manager in Florida.

Charles E. Swain, BBA is affiliated with Swain & Associates, a health care performance management training and consulting firm in Charlotte, NC. Charles has worked with health care professionals throughout the U.S. to help them develop skills in benchmarking, performance management, and statistical analysis. He is also principal with the Internet development and consulting firm, CSEnterprises. In this position he actively supports the Internet operations of several health care providers and consulting firms.