Clinical

The Right Care for Every Patient

Quality Insights is committed to being a valuable resource, offering services, information, technical assistance, and partnership to help dialysis facilities improve the level of care provided to patients with kidney disease.

Our Quality Improvement Department consists of a team of dedicated individuals who can work with dialysis facilities to:  

  • Help design and implement internal quality improvement activities (QIAs)

  • Provide tools for improving clinical outcomes

  • Demonstrate leadership readiness tools to help embrace change

  • Consult on quality improvement opportunities

  • Educate facility personnel on quality improvement and Network initiatives 

Please visit the links on the dialysis providers page for more in-depth information.  If you can not find the resources you seek online, please contact us.

2023 Network Goals

Quality Insights Renal Network 4 is providing Network facilities with 2023 Network 4 Goals.

We ask that you attest in the following site after you receive and review these goals. If you oversee more than one facility, please add all the CCN number in one attestation. The following link will take you to the attestation.

Quality Improvement Projects

Quality Insights Renal Network 4 is one of 18 Medicare-funded organizations in the United States responsible for improving the quality of care delivered to patients with End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD). To assist in this endeavor, we conduct a variety of Quality Improvement Projects, under the direction of the Medical Review Board.

Patient Safety

Quality Insights Renal Network 4 believes it important that each dialysis provider incorporate patient safety values into their organizational culture. We encourage all dialysis providers to initiate specific measures that can be incorporated into the daily facility environment, to further educate both patients and facility staff, and enhance the overall level of safety within a facility.

Additional Resources

National Health Safety Network Resources

  • The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN) is one of the nation’s most widely used healthcare-associated infection (HAI) data tracking system. NHSN provides healthcare facilities, states, regions and the nation with data needed to identify HAI problem areas, measure progress of infection prevention interventions and ultimately may serve as a tool to assist in the elimination of healthcare-associated infections.

Additional Infection Prevention Information

  • Additional infection prevention information is available on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) website. All patients should be encouraged to review this information.

Putting Together the Pieces to Prevent Infections in Dialysis Patients

  • This 11”X17” wall poster is a visual reminder of measures that staff can take to reduce infection in dialysis patients. The network encourages all facilities to post the Provider Poster in a location that will be viewed by patients.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) "Infection Prevention in Dialysis Settings" Course

Keeping Kidney Patients Safe

  • The Renal Physicians Association (RPA) and the Forum of End-Stage Renal Disease developed the Keeping Kidney Patients Safe website to serve as a resource for nephrology professionals who are committed to optimum levels of kidney patient safety. The site includes information pertaining to incorrect dialyzers or dialyzing solution, patient falls, medication errors and omissions, hand hygiene, and non-adherence procedures.

Five Steps to Safer Health Care

  • Patient safety is one of the Nation's most pressing health care challenges. A recent report by the Institute of Medicine estimates that as many as 44,000 to 98,000 people die in U.S. hospitals each year as the result of lapses in patient safety. This fact sheet tells what you can do to get safer health care.

20 Tips to Help Prevent Medical Errors in Adults

  • Medical errors are one of the Nation's leading causes of death and injury. A recent report by the Institute of Medicine estimates that as many as 44,000 to 98,000 people die in U.S. hospitals each year as the result of medical errors. This means that more people die from medical errors than from motor vehicle accidents, breast cancer, or AIDS.

20 Tips to Help Prevent Medical Errors in Children

  • Medical errors are one of the Nation's leading causes of death and injury. Rates of medication errors and adverse drug events for hospitalized children were comparable to rates for hospitalized adults in a 2001 study in the Journal of the American Medical Association. However, the rate for potential adverse drug events was three times higher in children, and substantially higher still for babies in neonatal intensive care units. Studies of medical errors outside the hospital are just getting underway. This fact sheet is intended to help parents help their children avoid medical errors.

Water Quality Testing Chart

  • Based on the current AAMI standards for hemodialysis systems and for hemodialyzer reuse, the Water Quality Testing Chart provides a quick reference guide for use in the dialysis facility water treatment area.