EASTON, Md., May 10 /PRNewswire/ -- Delmarva Foundation, a national not- for-profit organization committed to improving the quality of healthcare, announced today that it has been awarded a 14-month contract for $600,000 by the District of Columbia’s Health Care Safety Net Administration (HCSNA) to monitor services provided to the uninsured. Delmarva will assess the appropriateness and quality of service given to the working poor without insurance when they are treated at emergency departments, hospitals, and clinics in the District.
“We are very pleased to have been selected to work on this project with the DC Department of Health and HCSNA. It fits in perfectly with our corporate mission to assure access and quality of care to all patients no matter who is paying for it. Delmarva has worked for many years in the District doing such things as quality assessment for Medicare and Medicaid so this is a natural extension of that work,” said Maulik Joshi, DrPH, President and Chief Executive Officer, Delmarva Foundation.
Delmarva’s new contract with the District calls for the development of a quality-monitoring program that will include hospital and clinic reviews. A monthly sample of hospital discharges will be reviewed to see that the admissions were appropriate and that professional standards of quality were met. Clinics will be examined to evaluate their readiness to treat patients, the systems utilized and the quality of care given to patients. Delmarva will also conduct a special study of emergency department usage to identify the quality of care and to analyze access issues.
HCSNA is an agency of the DC Department of Health (DOH) whose mission is to ensure that eligible uninsured residents of the District of Columbia are provided access to quality health care. The Health Care Safety Net Administration has oversight and monitoring responsibility over the DC Healthcare Alliance, which arose in 2001 after the closing of D.C. General, the District’s primary healthcare provider for the poor. The alliance is comprised of Children’s National Medical Center, Howard University Hospital, Providence Hospital, Washington Hospital Center, George Washington University Hospital and Greater Southeast Community Hospital. In the past two years, the D.C. Health Alliance paid out $97 million to cover the medical expenses of low-income patients and about two-thirds of the money went to hospitals.
“Since the closing of D.C. General, we have been working hard to make sure that we provide the highest quality and most effective healthcare to members of the D.C. Health Alliance program. It is an important task that we have given Delmarva to produce a semi-annual study of the overall quality of care in the hospitals, emergency departments and clinics that participate. With Delmarva’s help we will continue to critique our systems and assess our service to ensure we provide the best care possible,” said Brenda Emanuel, M.P.A., Deputy Director, Health Care Safety Net Administration.
About Delmarva Foundation
Delmarva Foundation is a national, not-for-profit organization dedicated to improving healthcare quality in over 20 states. Since 1973, Delmarva has assisted in enhancing care in hospitals, nursing homes, home health agencies, and doctors’ offices and managed care plans. Delmarva conducts work ranging from quality improvement, quality assurance, utilization review to external quality review. The company’s corporate headquarters are located in Easton, Maryland with other offices in Baltimore, Maryland; Washington, DC; Charleston, West Virginia; Essex Junction, Vermont; Sacramento, California; Tampa, Florida; and Tallahassee, Florida. For more information, please visit Delmarva Foundation on the web at http://www.delmarvafoundation.org/.
Delmarva Foundation
CONTACT: Robin L. Wolfgang, Director, Communications, DelmarvaFoundation, +1-410-822-0697, rwolfgang@dfmc.org
Web site: http://www.delmarvafoundation.org/
