IHSIS

Initiatives

Improved Hearing Screening and Intervention Services (IHSIS)

A series of collaborative improvement projects to increase the rate of documented follow-up and intervention services for infants with hearing loss.

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Status: Complete

The multiple collaborative projects ran from 2010 to 2013.

  • Who: Early Hearing Detection and Intervention (EHDI) offices representing 28 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, in collaboration with parent partners, audiologists and other healthcare professionals and advocates.
  • Funder: This project was funded by the Health Resources and Service Administration’s Maternal and Child Health Bureau.
  • Our Role: Facilitated Breakthrough Series learning collaboratives to apply quality improvement methodology to improve the systems of care for children with hearing loss.

What IHSIS Project Participants Say

Working with NICHQ has been a very rewarding experience … A partnership with families has been a hallmark of what the Maternal and Child Health Bureau has done for years, but NICHQ really demonstrated how important those partnerships are.
SmileyFace

Irene Forsman, MS, RN-Project Funder

Being involved with NICHQ has been a career-changing and life-altering experience in many ways. Quality improvement methodology is not additive to my work, it influences how I do my daily work.
ElizabethSeeliger

Elizabeth Seeliger, AUD-Project Participant

At the beginning we thought that it'd be another project or another thing to do in our list of things we're supposed to do. But actually what I've learned is this is a better way to do things—a faster, better and effective way. You have to have a goal and objectives. When you work through the process we've been learning at NICHQ, everything is very efficient.
SmileyFace

Marbely Barahona-Parent Partner

Prior to the working with NICHQ, we had had some broad areas of focus for our plan for the year, but really had no strategy or mechanism for testing whether a change that we implemented was an improvement. And we’d always implement statewide before knowing if the change was beneficial. I’ve seen other participants in NICHQ projects make a similar shift and now think about how things are possible instead of impossible.
ElizabethSeeliger

Elizabeth Seeliger, AUD-Project Participant

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NICHQ Webinar

Toolkit: Defining and Assessing Early Childhood System Performance for Quality Improvement

July 20, 2021 from 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM (EDT)

Early childhood systems exist to improve outcomes for children and families, but it can be a challenge to tell the story of why our system-building efforts matter. To help system builders and stakeholders identify ways their system is working well, as well as areas for improvement, the Center for the Study of Social Policy (CSSP) developed the Early Childhood System Performance Assessment Toolkit in partnership with members of its Early Childhood Learning and Innovation Network for Communities (EC-LINC).

During the past year, in partnership with National Institute for Children’s Health Quality (NICHQ) and Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems Collaborative Improvement and Innovation Network (ECCS CoIIN) Teams, CSSP has updated and expanded the Toolkit to improve its alignment with the ECCS CoIIN logic model. This webinar will provide an overview of the Toolkit, including two new and two revised measures, and ways communities can use measures from the Toolkit to improve their system’s performance.

Webinar Objectives:

  • Participants will be able to articulate how an early childhood system contributes to better outcomes for young children and their families

  • Participants will improve their understanding of the concept of system performance

  • Participants will be able to identify measures from the Early Childhood System Performance Assessment Toolkit that they could use in their own systems

Moderator: Loraine Swanson, MPH, Senior Project Director, NICHQ

Speakers:

  • Cailin O’Connor, MS, Senior Associate, Center for the Study of Social Policy (CSSP)

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Toolkit: Defining and Assessing Early Childhood System Performance for Quality Improvement

Date

During the past year, in partnership with National Institute for Children’s Health Quality (NICHQ) and Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems Collaborative Improvement and Innovation Network (ECCS CoIIN) Teams, CSSP has updated and expanded the Toolkit to improve its alignment with the ECCS CoIIN logic model. This webinar will provide an overview of the Toolkit, including two new and two revised measures, and ways communities can use measures from the Toolkit to improve their system’s performance.

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