Quality and Safety

The Department of Surgery is committed to improving the quality of surgical care for all patients. Through research and continual quality improvement measures, we strive to ensure the best possible outcomes.

The Department participates in the National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP), a voluntary program of the American College of Surgeons that provides risk-adjusted data among a range of postoperative outcomes. This information allows our surgeons to compare their results with expect outcomes that are calculated according to patients’ severity of illness.

Many of our faculty participate in research to assess quality of care, and develop and evaluate innovative programs to improve patient outcomes.

Quality and safety initiatives include the ICOUGH program, designed to help patients reduce pulmonary complications after surgery. A paper in the Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Safety details a decade of experience with ICOUGH.