Last month at Leadership Forum I was pleased to present the esteemed James T. Dove Quality Award to the Wisconsin Chapter. The award is named after former ACC President and Chair of the Board of Governors, who left to us the legacy and the challenge to always strive to continually improve our practices, environments, patient care, and profession, no matter the challenges.

The chapter, through the guidance of Tom Lewandowski, MD, FACC and other Wisconsin ACC Leadership, has truly been a champion of implementing the ACC’s quality tools to improve patient care in the state.  The chapter recently engaged on an ambitious quality improvement project to combine all of the ACC’s tools into a focused project to address documented clinical quality, resource use, and cost variation in the treatment of stable ischemic heart disease (SIHC) called SMARTCare.

Using ACC-developed tools like FOCUS and data from the registries, SMARTCare brings science to the bedside to create a more robust method for assessing quality, cost and outcomes for care delivery. The chapter has been working closely with ACC staff to develop this ongoing project which is a collaboration with integrated health care systems, statewide, multi-stakeholder collaborative groups, including business coalitions, measurement and data collaborative groups, and a payment reform partnership.

This groundbreaking project aims to change the face of cardiology nationwide and will be a model for other states to use in the future. The chapter continues to develop SMARTCare Delivery and has even combined efforts with the Florida Chapter to develop a joint Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation Center (CMMI) Innovation Grant proposal. This proposal results from an immense amount of work, dedication, and time on the part of many, many hard working professionals.  We learn of the results of the grant proposal within the month. Congratulations and good luck!

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