The Quality Colloquium

Overview

What:

The Healthcare Colloquium conference series addresses issues of healthcare policy and practice through executive courses offered at major academic institutions. The first Colloquium, which addressed the impact of the Internet on healthcare, took place on the campus of Harvard University in August of 2000. Subsequent Colloquia were held on the campus of Harvard on healthcare quality and medical error reduction in 2001, 2003 and 2004, and healthcare privacy, data security and HIPAA in 2001 and 2002.

The Colloquium is not an academic program of Harvard University. It is a program sponsored by the major association sponsors listed on the face of the brochure.

This special edition of the Colloquium will address the issues of patient safety, healthcare quality and medical errors reduction.

The Colloquium:

is held on major university campuses to facilitate the learning environment,
provides a unique approach to executive education in healthcare,
is intensive and limits capacity so that participants have access to the first rate faculty,
emphasizes networking opportunities with other participants, and
posts faculty materials and secondary source materials to the Colloquium web site.

The Topic:

This special edition of the Healthcare Colloquium Series provides a strategic road map for healthcare purchasers, plans and providers in their efforts to enhance patient safety, reduce medical errors and improve healthcare quality.

The magnitude of the patient safety problem has been well documented by the Institute of Medicine and widely discussed. The Colloquium faculty of national and international experts will dig deeper into the underlying causes of these problems and articulate possible cures.

Many hospitals, clinics, health plans and others have launched a variety of initiatives to reduce medical errors and improve safety. Many such initiatives have enjoyed substantial success in reducing risks and enhancing the safety of patient care in these organizations. The Colloquium will feature case studies in successful efforts in safety improvement and will focus on presentations from organizations and individuals that have succeeded in reducing or eliminating risks to patients and improving the safety of their care.

The Setting:

Harvard University, the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States, was established in 1636 by a vote of the Great and General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and was named for its first benefactor, John Harvard of Charlestown, a young minister who upon his death in 1638, left his library and half of his estate to the new institution. Today, Harvard has grown to become a great undergraduate and graduate research University, with more than 18,000 degree candidates enrolled.

Where:

The Colloquium takes place on the campus of Harvard University. Morning, afternoon and evening classes are held in Annenberg Hall of the Sanders Theatre Complex. Named in memory of Roger Annenberg, '62 and inspired by the great halls of Oxford and Cambridge Universities, this room is arguably the most impressive space at Harvard.

For years Harvard students took major examinations at Annenberg Hall. It has also been the site of many significant ceremonies. The great Henry James described Annenberg Hall in The Bostonian as "the great bristling brick Valhalla....that house of honor and hospitality which... dispenses...laurels to the dead and dinners to the living."

Who Should Attend:

Senior Clinicians Engaged in Medical and Ancillary Practice

Trustees of Health Care Organizations

Employers and Healthcare Purchaser Representatives

Health Insurance and Health Plan Executives

Hospital and Health System Administrators

IPA and Medical Group Managers

Patient Safety Officers

Quality Assurance and Risk Management Experts

Healthcare Consultants, Venture Capitalists and Investment Bankers

Healthcare Attorneys and In-House Counsel

Health Service Researchers and Health Policy Experts

Registered Nurses, Pharmacists and Other Allied Health Professionals

Learning Objectives:

To render an overview of the healthcare quality and medical errors challenges facing American healthcare.

To share and discuss specific successful patient safety innovations that can be applied by healthcare organization within fiscal constraints.

To suggest strategies to successfully design and implement patient safety innovations in hospitals, health plans, medical groups and other healthcare settings.

To describe the respective roles of government, accrediting bodies, the press, employers, technology and information systems, hospitals and health systems, physicians and physician organizations, pharmaceutical and device manufacturers, and patients and families in stimulating and supporting patient safety improvement.

To implement a practical program of patient safety officer training.

Comments from Past Colloquium Attendees:

I don't believe that I have been to a meeting where I learned more, was challenged to change more and never fell asleep during at least one of the lectures.

Clearly the best conference, overall, I have attended in the last few years.

I came for the program-total immersion (and overload!)-and that is what I got. The broad coverage, large number of speakers, depth of information was fantastic for someone who knows enough to know they need to know lots more.

This is the best course I've been to in the last five years.

The best educational program I have attended.

Having it on campus gives it a great ambiance.

The quality of the faculty was superb.

I found the Colloquium to be one of the most intellectually stimulating, and professionally gratifying experiences I have had in quite some time. Thank you for a wonderful week.

Thorough, comprehensive, informative.

Wonderful in all respects.

Extremely well done, especially considering the breadth of the topic.

A fantastic experience.

This was an exceptional program on healthcare-truly one of the most comprehensive I've ever seen.