Improving the Quality of Health Care through 25 Years of Statewide Collaboration in Michigan

Abstract

Summary For the past 25 years in Michigan, the Collaborative Quality Initiatives (CQIs) have taken a cooperative bottom-up approach to health care quality improvement. Made up of physician organizations and hospitals around the state and led by local clinicians who set the quality improvement agenda, the CQIs rely on an approach that uses granular data collection, analysis, and transparency to develop and implement practice improvements to support a learning health system. The quality improvement work of the CQIs is administered directly by clinician leaders who direct statewide consortiums of their peers. Each CQI is financially supported by Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan. There are currently 23 active CQIs, each of which focuses on a specific clinical specialty or challenge. In this article, the authors review the processes and results of this collaborative approach to health care quality improvement.