Improving Improvement: Lessons from Surgery (Clifford Ko, M.D.)

February 14, 2024
precisionhealth.missouri.edu/...
“Improving Improvement: Generalizable Lessons of Improvement from Surgery”
Speaker:
Clifford Ko, MD, MS, MSHS, FACS, FASCRS
Director of the Division of Research & Optimal Patient Care at the American College of Surgeons (ACS)
Director, ACS National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP)
Robert & Kelly Day Professor of Surgery, UCLA
Professor of Health Services, UCLA School of Public Health
Date: Feb. 14, 2024, noon-1 p.m.
Location: Roy Blunt NextGen Precision Health Building, Atkins Family Seminar Room
Description
Improvement is important across industries given the advances in knowledge, understanding and technology. This is particularly true in health care. With experts estimating the health care knowledge half-life is 73 days, continued learning, change and improvement in patient care is paramount, including in surgery. Yet an increasing number of studies have demonstrated achieving improvement is often complex and difficult, efforts are suboptima, and yields are thus marginalized. This lecture will share Dr. Ko’s experiences and ongoing efforts to improve improvement.
About the Speaker
Dr. Ko’s work focuses on surgical quality of care, including quality measurement, process improvement, value-Clifford Kobased care and achieving high reliability in surgical care. He has served in advisory roles to national and international efforts for achieving higher quality and safety including the World Health Organization, the National Academy of Medicine, the National Quality Forum and PCORI, among others. He has received millions of dollars in grant funding to study quality of care from sources that include the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the American Cancer Society, the Centers of Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and the Veterans Administration. He has published over 400 peer reviewed manuscripts, more than 20 book chapters and two books. Clinically, Dr. Ko is a double board-certified surgeon with a practice currently focusing on patients with colorectal cancer. Dr. Ko received his B.A (Biology), M.S. (Biological/Medical Ethics) and M.D. from the University of Chicago. He also received a Master’s of Science (Health Services/Outcomes Research) from the University of California, Los Angeles during his time as a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Fellow at UCLA and RAND. Dr. Ko completed his General Surgery Residency at UCLA Medical Center and obtained specialty training at the Lahey Clinic in Boston in colon and rectal surgery.