AHRQ - Innovations Exchange

The Health Care Innovations Exchange is an AHRQ program designed to support health care professionals in sharing and adopting innovations that improve the delivery of care to patients. Explore this site to find innovative strategies and quality-related tools, learn how to improve your organization's ability to innovate and adopt new ideas, and interact with innovators and adopters.

Browse the Innovations Exchange by Subject

Find Innovations and QualityTools classified by disease or clinical category, patient population, stage of care, setting of care, and more.

What's New at AHRQ Health Care Innovations Exchange

December 22, 2008 (Missed an issue of What's New? Visit the Archive.)

The theme of this issue is improving the health literacy of patients. Ninety million Americans have difficulty understanding and acting on health information, according to the 2004 Institute of Medicine Report: Health Literacy: A Prescription to End Confusion.

The featured innovations describe health care programs or processes that address the literacy needs of patients.

This Issue's Featured Innovations

Diabetes Education Program in Health Center Waiting Room Improves Health Literacy
Lincoln Medical and Mental Health Center implemented a diabetes education program in the waiting room to improve patients' health literacy and self-management skills.

Program Makes Staff More Sensitive to Health Literacy and Promotes Access to Understandable Health Information
The Health Literacy Collaborative of the Iowa Health System educates staff on the importance of communicating health information clearly to patients and families regardless of reading ability, creates easy-to-understand materials based on patients’ needs and preferences, and trains health care workers to use these materials with their patients.

Public Hospital Improves Informed Consent Process To Better Serve Patients With Low Literacy and Limited English Proficiency
San Francisco General Hospital revised its informed consent process to help ensure that patients with limited English proficiency understand the procedures being recommended and thus can give truly informed consent; the centerpiece of the new process is a revised consent form, written in multiple languages, that encourages "teach-back" methods and use of medical interpreters when necessary.

Go to this issue's contents.| Go to all innovations by posted date.

Featured QualityTools

The featured QualityTools offer practical information ranging from a health literacy Web site to a guide for reviewing and analyzing barriers to literacy in your health care organization.

Go to this issue's QualityTools.| Go to all QualityTools by posted date.

Last updated: December 22, 2008.

New Innovations Exchange Page: Linking Clinical Practices and the Community for Health Promotion

Expert Commentaries:

•	Palliative Care Fills a Need in Modern Medicine for Holistic Care

•	Hair Stylists are Strategic Health Promoters in Black Communities

•	Patient-Centered Care: Regaining a Lost Art in Medicine

Human Interest Story: EXTREME Health Challenge Empowers Student to Make Healthy Choices

AHRQ Funding Opportunity Announcement: Researching Implementation and Change while Improving Quality

Register Now for Upcoming AHRQ Webinar: Engaging Stakeholders: How to Obtain and Retain Buy-in for Your Innovations
When: January 27, 2009;2-3:30 p.m. EST

•	Read about ways to cultivate innovation and overcome challenges to adopting new ideas.

•	Connect and collaborate with people who have similar interests and goals

The Health Care Innovations Exchange benefits from the guidance and input of a multidisciplinary group of highly qualified medical professionals.

Paul E. Plsek, MS
Paul E. Plsek & Associates, Inc.; Author: Creativity, Innovation, and Quality

Visit all expert biographies.