The chief quality officer and executive director of the Institute for Health Care Delivery Research at Intermountain Healthcare will speak at a Brigham Young University Forum Tuesday (March 18) at 11 a.m. in the Marriott Center.
Dr. Brent James is known internationally for his work in clinical quality improvement, patient safety, and the infrastructure that underlies successful improvement efforts, such as culture change, data systems, payment methods, and management roles.
For more than 20 years, Dr. James has championed the standardization of clinical care through data collection and analysis on a wide variety of treatment protocols and complex care processes. In the tradition of medical pioneers Florence Nightingale and Abraham Flexner, he has devoted himself to using quality improvement tools to better understand the cause and effect relationship between various practice and environmental factors.
Today, nearly 100 years after his mentors’ groundbreaking discoveries, Dr. James firmly believes that the practice of medicine and delivery of health care stands at another critical crossroads.
If the health care field is to successfully bridge the quality chasm defined by the Institute of Medicine, a new and innovative approach to the practice of health care is mandatory. Dr. James feels strongly that the time has come to shift from the “craft-base” practice of medicine to evidence-directed teams focused on patient care.
