UCI Health selected for nationwide collaborative to accelerate expansion of age-friendly care for older adults
Academic health system is one of 30 participants nationwide
April 26, 2024
“UCI Health is committed to staying on the leading edge of patient care, always looking for proven ways to deliver safe, equitable, and reliable care to all of our patients,” says
Dr. Lisa Gibbs, medical director of
UCI Health Senior Health Services.
Orange, Calif. — UCI Health is proud to announce its selection for participation in the Age-Friendly System-Wide Spread Collaborative.
This first-of-its-kind collaborative, led by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), has selected 30 U.S. health systems that will accelerate and spread adoption of evidence-based, high-quality care for older adults across all of their sites and care settings.
The collaborative is the latest endeavor of the Age-Friendly Health Systems initiative, which promotes four evidence-based elements of high-quality care, known as the 4Ms: What Matters, Medication, Mentation and Mobility.
The UCI Medical Center Inpatient Care Unit earned the initiative’s Committed to Care Excellence designation in 2021 after demonstrating reliable practice of the 4Ms in its outpatient primary care services (Level 2) and the medical center’s emergency department (Level 1). The ED also holds a Gold Level 1 Geriatric ED accreditation, given by The American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP).
During the 18-month collaborative, the UCI Health SeniorHealth Center will fine-tune these measures of excellence and test changes to ensure that the 4Ms are provided equitably as a standard practice to older adults who receive care across its entire system. All participating teams will learn from each other, as well as expert faculty, to be counted among the first health systems to achieve an ambitious new IHI recognition for systemwide spread of age-friendly care.
“UCI Health is committed to staying on the leading edge of patient care, always looking for proven ways to deliver safe, equitable, and reliable care to all of our patients,” said Dr. Lisa Gibbs, professor and chief of the UCI School of Medicine’s Division of Geriatric Medicine & Gerontology “The Age-Friendly Systems-Wide Spread Collaborative advances this commitment and will give us additional insights and tools to provide the highest standard of care to every older adult at every care interaction.”
“We are honored to have UCI Health participating in this collaborative and applaud their dedication to equitably delivering age-friendly care to older adults and their family caregivers across their practices, hospitals and nursing homes,” said Leslie Pelton, MPA, Vice President, IHI. “This is an exciting and ambitious endeavor and a testament to the increasing importance of the Age-Friendly Health Systems movement as we prepare our health systems and workforce to provide excellent care to the growing older adult population.”
Since 2018, the movement has recognized 3,907 care settings that provide age-friendly care centered around what matters to older adults and their families, with 3.29 million older adults benefitting from this increased level of attention and expertise. Age-Friendly Health Systems is an initiative of The John A. Hartford Foundation and IHI, in partnership with the American Hospital Association (AHA) and the Catholic Health Association of the United States (CHA).
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About UCI Health
UCI Health is the clinical enterprise of the University of California, Irvine, and the only academic health system based in Orange County. UCI Health is comprised of its main campus, UCI Medical Center, a 459-bed, acute care hospital in in Orange, Calif., four hospitals and affiliated physicians of the UCI Health Community Network in Orange and Los Angeles counties and ambulatory care centers across the region. Listed among America’s Best Hospitals by U.S. News & World Report for 23 consecutive years, UCI Medical Center provides tertiary and quaternary care and is home to Orange County’s only National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center, high-risk perinatal/neonatal program and American College of Surgeons-verified Level I adult and Level II pediatric trauma center, gold level 1 geriatric emergency department and regional burn center. UCI Health serves a region of nearly 4 million people in Orange County, western Riverside County and southeast Los Angeles County. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter.
