Congratulations to Sheri LaVela, PhD, MPH, MBA, who was just awarded a VA Grant for a Patient-Centered Care Evaluation Center.  The main goal of this center grant, CEPEP, is to evaluate the processes and outcomes of approaches to implementing patient-centered care and cultural transformation at the patient, family/caregiver, provider/employee, and system levels within and across the Veterans Health Administration Centers of Innovation to identify the most effective ways to change (improve) culture throughout the organization.  Here are the specifics:

PI:  Sherri L. LaVela, PhD, MPH, MBA                                
Title:  Center for Evaluation of Practices and Experiences of Patient-centered Care (CEPEP)
Amount: $996,852                Period: 01/2013-12/2014
Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Patient-Centered Care and Cultural Transformation (OPCC&CT) and Quality Enhancement Research Initiative

On Monday November 12, 2012, Dr. Jane Holl and staff hosted an event to commemorate and say thank you to all the community members, stakeholders, hospitals, and researchers that contributed to the success of the National Children’s Study Greater Chicago Study Center (NCS-GCSC).

The National Children’s Study Appreciation Event included presentations from Jane Holl, MD, MPH, GCSC PI and Director, Center for Healthcare Studies, Arden Handler, DrPH, Co-Director, Maternal and Child Health Program, University of Illinois at Chicago, and Ann Borders, MD, MSc, MPH, Maternal/Fetal Medicine, Evanston Hospital, NorthShore University Health System, University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine. The evening was topped off with wonderful hors’doeuvres and a special NCS cake!  The NCS-GCSC was successful because of the substantial support from everyone involved. It was a great honor to hold this gathering as a way to say ‘thank you’ to all of the Study’s supporters.  Dr. Holl thanks everyone that was able to attend, and to those who could not attend, please know that you were greatly missed.
                                    

The Northwestern University Biomedical Informatics Center (NUBIC) announced last week that it has been awarded $3.695 million for the next year to continue to lead an Open Source Information Management System (IMS) Consortium for ten National Children’s Study (NCS) Site Locations. This initiative has resulted in the formation of the NCS Navigator Information Management Hub. NCS Navigator is an open source information management system that is ideally suited to provide operational and case management capabilities for the National Children’s Study.  Northwestern University has been the lead institution for the NCS in the greater Chicago area under the leadership of Dr. Jane Holl, MD MPH. Dr. Holl and Dr. Richard Gershon, PhD have recently been awarded the South Regional Operations Center, enabling Northwestern to play a lead role in continuing the NCS at ten study locations in the south of the United States. Read more here.

Sherri L. LaVela, PhD, MPH, MBA, a faculty member of the Center for Healthcare Studies was recently awarded funding from the Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Patient-Centered Care and Cultural Transformation (OPCC&CT) and Quality Enhancement Research Initiative. The 2-year center grant: ‘Center for Evaluation of Practices and Experiences of Patient-centered Care (CEPEP)” will evaluate the processes and outcomes of approaches to implementing patient-centered care and cultural transformation at the patient, family/caregiver, provider/employee, and system levels within and across the Veterans Health Administration Centers of Innovation to identify the most effective ways to change (improve) culture throughout the organization.

Three fellows in the Health Services and Outcomes Research Program, Stephanie Shintani Smith, MD, Kyle Zanocco, MD, and Chia-Chiang Wang, PhD, were recently awarded the Northwestern University EDW Young Investigator Seed Grant for their proposal, "Surgeon Influence on Anesthetic Efficiency in the Operating Room." They plan to investigate if characteristics and communication style of the surgeon significantly impacts anesthesia efficiency. The proposal was inspired by a group project in the fellowship Health Services Research Quality and Safety Topics Course, taught by fellowship director Jane Holl, MD.

Andrew Gawron, MD PhD, post-doctoral fellow in the Integrated Fellowship in Health Services and Outcomes Research and Gastroenterology& Hepatology recently published a study about the staggering increased risk of dying from cancer faced by middle-aged smokers. Read the NU press release at
http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2012/09/middle-age-smoking.html