Comprehensive Quality Management Systems – Ensuring High Quality of Care 

November 20 from 7:45A.M. to 9:15 A.M. at St. Luke’s Institute for Health Education. 

Six Sigma and Lean are gaining wider acceptance in healthcare organizations. However, the deployment of Six Sigma and or Lean alone is not enough to ensure that healthcare organizations continuously deliver high quality of care. These are two, of many, quality improvement methods that reduce defects and waste respectively. And, they are not appropriate methods to solve all quality related problems a healthcare organization contends with. What is required to continuously deliver high quality of care is a comprehensive, integrated quality management system that promptly identifies quality problems and deploys the most appropriate quality improvement method to solve the problem in the time frame required.  This panel will present a framework for the development of a comprehensive, integrated quality management system. The program will begin with a brief presentation by the moderator, followed by remarks from each of the three panelists on various aspects of the quality management system. The program will conclude with a 15 minute question and answer period.

Robert Sutter, Jr, RN, MBA, MHA, Six Sigma Master Black Belt -Robert spent thirteen years of his career as a Certified Registered Nurse Anesthestist and then subsequently earned an MBA and MHA from Saint Louis University. For the past 12 years he has been involved in healthcare quality measurement and improvement. He has led a community wide initiative to measure hospital quality and developed quality measurement systems for health systems and hospitals. In addition, he is a Six Sigma Master Black Belt and has provided Six Sigma and Lean consulting services in healthcare and non-healthcare industries.