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Northwest Kidney Centers wins award for supporting kidney transplants
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Nonprofit dialysis provider Northwest Kidney Centers has received Qualis Health’s 2015 Washington Award of Excellence in Healthcare Quality for Outpatient Services in recognition of its multiyear initiative to foster kidney transplants.
Northwest Kidney Centers was one of seven organizations from across the state honored for improving health care quality and outcomes. Qualis Health is a population health management organization.
Read also: Collaboration, focus drive transplant success rate at Northwest Kidney Centers
To better help patients seeking transplantation, Northwest Kidney Centers launched a focused initiative in 2009. It aimed to:
- Address patients’ needs before, during and after transplant
- Educate patients about transplantation
- Track each patient’s transplant status
- Remove barriers to transplantation and collaborate with local hospital transplant programs.
The program has been so successful that in 2014, Northwest Kidney Centers’ transplant rate was 80% better than the national average. The number of its dialysis patients who received a kidney transplant increased by 14% in 2014 compared to 2013, while the national average declined by 16 percent.
The award recipients were recognized during Qualis Health’s 2015 Northwest Patient Safety Conference on May 13 in Lynnwood, Wash.