Mission
The Pittsburgh Regional Health Initiative, or PRHI, is an independent catalyst for improving healthcare safety and quality in Southwestern Pennsylvania. It operates on the premise that dramatic quality improvement is the best cost-containment strategy for health care.
PRHI was the first regional consortium of medical, business and civic leaders to address healthcare safety and quality improvement as a social and business imperative. Turning its own community into a demonstration lab, PRHI strives to accelerate improvement and set the pace for the nation. Its experiment reflects three principles:
- Health care is local. Federal policy changes alone cannot achieve needed reform.
- Those who work at the point of care develop quality and safety improvements that work and last.
- Continuous improvement in quality and safety requires the highest possible standard, namely perfection. To settle for less limits achievement.
PRHI offers healthcare leaders the necessary tools, expertise, education, models and networks to perfect patient care and safety in their organizations. Using the Toyota Production System as a model, PRHI developed a quality improvement method for clinical settings known as Perfecting Patient Caresm. PRHI teaches this method through a four-day curriculum called Perfecting Patient Caresm University, as well as in advanced and individualized courses and on-site coaching.
Thousands across the nation have already learned how Perfecting Patient Caresm can transform health care. Together, they demonstrate the value of quality engineering in any healthcare setting—from neighborhood clinics, to hospitals and nursing homes.
PRHI is a nonprofit operating arm of the Jewish Healthcare Foundation with funding from local corporations, foundations, health plans and government contracts and grants.