Institute for Healthcare Improvement: Spreading Change: from Collaboratives to Campaigns and Beyond

Listen to the November 30, 2006, informational call about this program with faculty members Marie W. Schall, MA, and Joe McCannon.

Achieving breakthrough performance in any area of an organization is a significant accomplishment. But an equally important and sometimes more perplexing challenge often remains: how to spread the success to other facilities or departments. CEOs of many health care organizations say that spreading change beyond its original venue is their greatest challenge, and the full potential of their initial investment in system change is often not realized.

IHI has accumulated a great deal of knowledge on how to effectively spread best practices in health care organizations. This comes from our experience in having developed and implemented two highly successful spread programs — the Breakthrough Series Collaboratives in the 1990s and the 100,000 Lives Campaign in 2004 — as well as having contributed to large-scale spread projects at the Veterans Health Administration, the Bureau of Primary Health Care, and the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK. Based on these experiences, we have developed a Framework for Spread that establishes a systematic approach for accelerating improvement.

Now, we are pleased to bring our best knowledge and ideas about successful spread methodology together into a valuable — and practical — seminar for health care leaders from both inpatient and ambulatory care settings.

What You'll Learn

Who Should Attend

Participants will gain a deep understanding of the science of spreading improvement and will learn how to best apply spread methodologies in their organizations. The unique challenges of both inpatient and ambulatory care settings will be discussed.

Specific learning objectives include:

Examples of successful spread strategies and methods (campaigns, collaboratives, and other methods to support shared learning and the rapid adoption of new ideas)
Identify actions that senior leaders can take to support spread
Develop a clear and measurable spread aim
Create powerful and effective communication messages
Create a measurement strategy to support spread
Describe methods for sustaining system-wide improvement

This seminar should be attended by the person who has the responsibility for leading the day-to-day spread work within their organization; the senior leader accountable for achieving the organization’s spread aims; administrators and managers in areas where the improvements will be made; physician and other clinical leaders; and members of successful pilot teams.

Administrative and clinical leaders of health care organizations
Quality professionals and others involved in broadly implementing best practices
Change agents charged with deployment
Leaders and staff from organizations participating as "Nodes" or "Partners" in the 100,000 Lives Campaign
Leaders from outside the United States interested in launching a national campaign

The seminar will be applicable to any type of organization or setting, including academic medical centers, community health centers, community hospitals, primary care and multispecialty clinics, as well as sponsors of state, regional and/or national spread efforts.

Developing Your Plan for Spreading Improvement

A core element of this program is the development of an action plan for spreading improvement. Your individual project will be the focus of this seminar and post-seminar web-based session. You will leave this interactive seminar with an initial spread plan and a specific set of activities to test and implement.

Participants should begin the program with a clear understanding of their organization and the improvement(s) they want to spread. The best way to get the most out of your participation is to identify an improvement that you intend to spread. During the seminar you will have the opportunity to develop a detailed plan for how to spread that improvement throughout your organization. The 100,000 Lives Campaign will be a special area of focus for those intending to launch a similar campaign in their region or country.

Ideally, the improvement that you select to focus on in this seminar should be:

Tested and implemented in some part of your organization (e.g., unit, clinic, etc.)
Of strategic importance to your organization

We encourage you to discuss your topic for spread with an executive leader prior to the seminar and to schedule a meeting with that same leader upon your return so that you can receive feedback and guidance on your spread plan.

Upon registration in this seminar, participants will receive materials to assist in preparing for the seminar.

Continued Support

After the program, participants will engage in a web-based session on Wednesday, April 4, 2007, from 1:00 PM - 3:00 PM Eastern Time where participants will share their experiences and refine their plans for achieving their spread aims.

Additional Information on Spread

A Framework for Spread: From Local Improvements to System-Wide Change — a free white paper.

100,000 Lives Campaign's Getting Started Kit on Sustainability and Spread.

Changes, Measures, and Tools for Spreading Change — related information in IHI.org's Topics section.