Focus Areas
While our expertise is based in learning and collaborating and can transcend across any health care field, over the 20+ years of experience, we have really gained expertise in the following focus areas. We’ve created ground breaking tools, are deeply networked within these fields, hosted collaborative webinars and conferences dedicated to these topics, and have established a nationwide expertise making us leaders within these focus areas.
Priority
With new rules and regulations on hospitals and health care organizations around the country by federal entities like Center for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS), we have developed expertise, tools & resources, and worked directly with providers around the country to ensure hospitals are actively working toward and feeling confident in the changes.
Social Determinants of Health (SDOH)
Convergence has a proven track record of collaborating with hospitals and providers to ensure that everyone has a fair and just chance to achieve their best health. We provide practical guidance and support to help you understand and address the non-medical factors that influence patients’ health, often called the social drivers of health (SDOH), and to uncover and address disparities that may exist in your community.
Our team facilitates learning collaboratives, workshops, and presentations that succinctly convey both the “why” and the “how” of best practices in SDOH screening—from how to build trust between patients and clinicians in these personal conversations, to how to analyze and interpret the wealth of data that arises from these routine screenings. We not only focus on best practices in screening, but also on how to forge new, interdisciplinary partnerships to meet the needs that screening reveals.
Our experts are on the cutting edge of discovering how to use data to understand community needs and prioritize health care resources and investments accordingly. We are relentlessly focused on moving beyond data and into action, in partnership with patients, clinicians, and communities. Together, we can create a plan for your hospital, organization, or state to better understand and use your SDOH and health equity data to drive meaningful change for both individual patients and your community as a whole.
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Montana Index for Healthy Communities - https://www.montanaihc.com/
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CMS Hospital Quality Improvement Contract (HQIC), 2019-2024. HQICs supported hospitals across the country to increase quality and patient safety for all patients, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, income level, or zip code. The Convergence team hosted a series of national webinars, open to hospitals across the country, to support implementation of new SDOH screening requirements.
SDOH Resource Round Up
Alphabet Soup: PDSAs & SDOH – Applying the Model for Improvement to Your Social Drivers of Health Screening Program
Join our upcoming webinars!
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State-based Learning Collaboratives for SDOH Screening (Alaska Hospital & Healthcare Association, Montana Hospital Association, Idaho Hospital Association, Alabama Hospital Association)
We partner with states to design a series of virtual and in-person sessions to support hospitals in setting up SDOH screening programs. Sessions include best practice sharing and peer-to-peer learning on topics such as process design, data analysis and submission, team engagement, and partnering with patients and community partners. At the end of the collaborative, participants will be able to confidently design a screening process to not only ensure compliance with CMS measures, but also effectively understand and address patients’ SDOH needs.
Montana Index for Healthy Communities (Montana Health Research & Education Foundation)
Convergence collaborated with MHREF to build a health and social needs index that quantifies the social, economic, and healthcare-related factors that influence the health of Montanans. We then convened pilot sites across the state to test how to meet those needs, like increasing access to transportation in rural areas or designing a CHNA process that is more inclusive of historically underrepresented perspectives. Learn more here: https://www.montanaihc.com/
California Department of Health Care Access and Information (HCAI) Hospital Equity Measures Advisory Committee
Convergence experts in quality measurement and health equity are consulting with the HCAI Health Equity Measures Advisory Committee to launch a first-of-its-kind state-wide program to promote understanding and transparency of health care disparities at a hospital level. Learn more here: https://hcai.ca.gov/data/healthcare-quality/hospital-equity-measures-reporting-program/
Patient Safety Structural Measure (PSSM)
The Patient Safety Structural Measure (PSSM) is a tool introduced by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to assess and enhance hospitals' commitment to patient safety. This measure evaluates whether hospitals have the necessary structures and practices to prioritize and implement patient safety. It focuses on a systems-based approach, aiming to reduce patient harm through organizational responsibility rather than individual blame.
PSSM includes five domains:
Leadership Commitment: Hospital leaders prioritize safety and integrate it into strategic decisions.
Strategic Planning and Policy: Hospitals develop safety-focused policies and goals, including equity.
Culture of Safety: Hospitals promote learning and psychological safety among staff.
Accountability and Transparency: Hospitals ensure openness in safety reporting and performance tracking.
Patient and Family Engagement: Patients and families are actively involved in safety initiatives.
Each domain is assessed through a set of attestation statements, and hospitals must meet all criteria in a domain to earn one point, with a maximum of five points. Check out what we are doing to prioritize this initiative:
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In December 2024, Convergence Health hosted our first of 5 webinar series to address PSSM within your organization.
The first of the series was all about addressing your questions by having a special guest Dr. Michelle Schreiber, Deputy Director, Center for Clinical Standards and Quality Director of the Quality Measurement and Value-Based Incentives Group with CMS as we dive into an overview of the measure and answer some of the most frequently asked questions. Check out the video here!
Critical Focus Areas
The Convergence team has Subject Matter Experts that continue to improve health care with ongoing nationwide initiatives and customized action plans directly with clients. We find that the following topic areas are some of the most critical and most essential for improvement within hospital settings around the nation.
Convergence has extensive experience supporting small, rural, Rural Emergency Hospitals (REHs) and Critical Access Hospitals (CAHs), as well as Provider-Based Rural Health Clinics (RHCs) and Swing Bed programs to build sustainable quality improvement infrastructure and improved outcomes. Our team has been working “on the ground” in rural health settings for more than two decades and have provided support to more than 800 organizations across the U.S. We have also partnered with several state Offices of Rural Health and State Flex Programs to provide support for hospitals implementing the MBQIP Program. Our support is customized to each organization’s needs and includes facilitation of peer to peer collaboration in-person and virtually, subject matter expertise for quality improvement activities, and the development of practical tools and resources for the organizations we serve .
Rural Health
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Rural and Critical Access Hospitals (CAHs) face unique challenges. Convergence Health’s tailored support helps to ensure these facilities remain vital pillars of their communities. For example, through the expertise of our Rural Health Initiatives experts, we supported hospitals transitioning to REH status with resources on performance metrics and emergency preparedness. Additionally, our programming has addressed specific needs of CAHs, such as staffing challenges and resource optimization with practical, actionable support. Throughout the past decade, our team has worked shoulder to shoulder with rural and CAH organizations through state and federally funded programs aimed at improving outcomes of care in rural settings. We have provided targeted mentorship and competency-building activities for new healthcare quality leaders, helped small organizations to better understand the approach to measuring and addressing quality improvement in small organizations, and built a platform that allows for real-time collaboration among healthcare organizations across the United States. Our targeted support for rural hospitals underscores our commitment to ensuring equitable care across all settings.
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At Convergence Health, we are dedicated to enhancing rural healthcare through a variety of impactful projects and activities. Our initiatives include the support of CAH Quality Infrastructure, ensuring rural-relevant quality reporting, and facilitating work to build seamless care transitions. We are committed to advancing quality and patient safety certification in rural organizations, and we provide tailored quality improvement support specifically designed for rural hospitals. By partnering with rural health providers nationwide, we strive to elevate the standard of healthcare in rural communities, ensuring they receive the quality care.
Patient Family Engagement
Patient Family Engagement (PFE) means actively involving patients and their family caregivers in health care decisions—whether at the bedside or within organizational operations. This approach ensures care is inclusive and tailored to the diverse needs, values, and backgrounds of the people we serve. Engaging patients, families, and caregivers effectively and equitably is essential to delivering safer, higher-quality care. Our team at Convergence Health is proud of our longstanding commitment to integrating the insights of people with lived experience into the fabric of our work. We have helped numerous organizations to build meaningful engagement of patients and families into quality and patient safety activities, including the design and implementation of Patient Family Advisory Councils, co-design of tools and resources with Patient Family Partners, and purposeful partnerships with advocacy organizations such as PFCCpartners.
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Ready, Set, Go!, a resource co-designed by Patient Family Partners, the Convergence team, and hospital representatives, was developed to address and connect the critical processes that take place during care transitions. This resource helps hospital teams with a focus on admission planning, bedside rounding, and discharge planning in an effort to reduce hospital readmissions. It includes key insights from patients and families, as well as care transitions improvement experts, into the three processes plus five embedded tools to enhance current processes at the hospital. The guided activities and implementation guidance in Ready, Set, Go! assist and support hospital teams to improve patient outcomes, the experience of receiving hospital care, and avoid readmissions.
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Through our work as the prime contractor for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) HQIC project, Convergence prioritized the engagement of patients and families as active participants through our partnership with PFCCpartners and the development of a Patient Family Partnership Council (PFPC). To demonstrate the power of co-design with patients and families, we routinely incorporated the insights and experiences of the PFPC, we fostered a culture of collaboration in the implementation of technical assistance tailored to hospital needs. By leveraging insights from experienced Patient Family Partners, hospitals in the project gained access to actionable strategies to integrate patient perspectives into quality improvement plans. 94% of hospitals enrolled in the project implemented action plans to improve the engagement of patients and families in quality and patient safety activities
Opioid Epidemic
Convergence Health, through its partnership with Cal Hospital Compare, has been instrumental in addressing the opioid crisis in California. In 2019, Cal Hospital Compare launched the Opioid Care Honor Roll Program, a three-year initiative aimed at reducing opioid use disorder (OUD) and related deaths, increasing access to addiction treatment for acute care patients, and recognizing individual hospitals' progress in these areas. To support this effort, the Opioid Management Hospital Self-Assessment tool was developed, which serves both as a measurement instrument and a roadmap of proven strategies for change. This tool was created through a collaborative effort involving hospital emergency, pharmacy, and quality departments, health plans, state agencies, and consumers. The program focuses on preventing new chronic opioid use, identifying and treating OUD, preventing overdoses, and addressing stigma to foster a culture of effective opioid care within hospitals. In 2024, the fifth year of the program, more than half of all hospitals across the state of California participated in improvement efforts through the program and are committed to addressing opioid use disorder. In addition to the Opioid Honor Roll program, Convergence has worked with hospitals across 33 states through federally-funded programs to partner together to implement best practices for opioid use disorder mitigation, including the development of tools and resources, educational programs, and individualized coaching for health care organizations.
Workforce Safety & Well Being
A safe and supportive environment—both physically and mentally—is essential for health care teams to excel in the demanding manual and cognitive tasks required in their daily workflows. At Convergence Health, we prioritize workforce safety and well-being as the foundation for delivering high-quality, patient-centered care. This includes protecting health care team members from physical harm while fostering psychological and emotional safety to enable effective engagement, communication, and collaboration.
We partner with health care organizations, frontline staff, and patients and families to uncover challenges to workforce safety and resilience. Together, we co-design tailored education programs and practical solutions to build safer, healthier workplaces that empower teams to deliver exceptional care.
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Workplace violence in healthcare poses significant challenges to staff wellbeing and patient safety. Convergence Health tackled this issue head-on, fostering a safer, more supportive environment for hospital teams. Convergence’s Workforce Wellbeing and Violence Prevention Series implemented during a federally funded large scale learning collaborative offered six virtual engagements featuring gap analyses, best practice dissemination, and facilitated peer-to-peer learning. Highlights included lessons from hospitals recovering from workplace violence incidents and collaboration strategies with law enforcement. Initial assessments identified gaps in de-escalation training and violence prevention protocols. Listening sessions provided hospitals with a platform to share challenges and solutions. Webinars showcased hospitals’ successes, and collaboration with state hospital associations amplified the reach and impact of these initiatives. As a result, all participating hospitals implemented or enhanced violence prevention programs. Feedback from participating hospitals highlighted improved staff confidence and reduced workplace incidents, and demonstrated the value of collaboration and shared learning under the guidance of the Convergence team.
Ongoing Topics
With over 20+ years of experience in the following ongoing topics, we dive deep into evidence-based best practices to create personalized improvement plans for your hospital or health care setting. We have dozens of projects and clients that we’ve worked with directly and nationwide initiatives that specifically address these focus areas. The heart and soul of the Convergence business and the reason we got into Health Improvement.
Focus areas
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The Convergence team consists of results-oriented experts who specialize in driving improvement at the intersection of social and technical factors within healthcare teams and communities. We prioritize agility, cost efficiencies, niche clinical experience, and strategic partnerships to bring high-value technical assistance and education. Our team of quality improvement experts bring experience with learning collaboratives, quality improvement science, patient experience, healthcare-acquired infections, care transitions, and social drivers of health in all health care settings.
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At Convergence Health, patient safety is at the core of our mission. We leverage decades of expertise in patient safety science to support healthcare organizations in creating safer environments for patients and providers alike. Our team uses data-driven strategies, evidence-based practices, and hands-on technical assistance to address complex challenges in infection prevention, medication safety, care transitions, and other concerns to improve both the outcomes of care for patients and the conditions in which that care is provided by health care teams. By collaborating with trusted local and national partners, we empower providers to build resilient and reliable systems and foster a culture of continuous learning and improvement. Together, we work to ensure every patient receives safe, equitable, and high-quality care.