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New Mid-Atlantic Hospital Safety
Initiative Sets Goal of Saving Thousands of Lives
CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield Gives $450,000 to Delmarva Foundation To
Underwrite One of the Nation's Largest Health Care Quality Improvement Efforts

Easton, MD, October 3, 2005 -
CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield and the Delmarva Foundation today announced a three-year hospital safety partnership aimed at making the Mid-Atlantic region’s hospitals the safest in the nation.  The “100k Lives and Beyond” Collaborative expands on the national initiative of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) to save 100,000 lives through improvements in health care by hospitals.

The Delmarva Foundation is already working with area hospitals that are among the 2,700 institutions nationally that have enlisted in IHI’s 100,000 Lives Campaign.  That national initiative has a goal of implementing six proven hospital practices designed to save 100,000 lives by June 2006 – including about 4,000 lives in the Mid-Atlantic region alone. The 100K Lives and Beyond Collaborative will extend those lifesaving measures into hospital intensive care units and operating rooms and expand the program to include hospitals throughout CareFirst’s service area in Maryland, Washington, the District of Columbia, Delaware and Northern Virginia.  The 100,000 Lives Campaign was developed and launched after landmark research from the Institute of Medicine revealed that as many as 98,000 Americans may die preventable deaths in hospitals each year due to medical mistakes. Additional studies found that evidence-based practices which could dramatically improve patient care were not being widely implemented.

"Research clearly shows that far too many Americans die preventable deaths in hospitals every year,” said David D. Wolf, CareFirst Executive Vice President, Medical Systems and Corporate Development.  “We can greatly reduce deaths by taking such relatively simple steps as ensuring that patients showing symptoms of heart attack are given aspirin or by preventing infections by setting an expectation that all health care providers wash their hands consistently when moving from patient to patient.”

The 100K Lives and Beyond Collaborative officially got underway in Washington at a day-long conference gathering of hundreds of members of area hospital operating room, intensive care unit and emergency department teams to learn, share and outline the steps necessary to implement the Campaign practices. The conference coincided with a campaign stop by IHI President and CEO Donald Berwick, M.D. – a leading national advocate for health care quality improvement and founder of the 100,000 Lives Campaign.

“The launch of the 100k Lives and Beyond Collaborative kicks off an exciting new partnership that will build on the momentum we have on the way to dramatically improving health care in the nation,” said Maulik Joshi, DrPH, President and CEO, Delmarva Foundation. “Working together, we can achieve results for our patients that make the vision of every person getting the right care, every time a reality.”

The 100K Lives and Beyond Collaborative focuses on six proven, life-saving care changes.  Intensive team workshops and local hospital interventions over the next 18 months will help hospitals implement changes designed to:

1. Empower any hospital staff member at any level to deploy rapid response teams at the first sign of a patient in distress;
2. Prevent adverse drug events by requiring review of medications to ensure that a patient receives the right dosage of the right medicine at admission, discharge and before transfer;
3. Prevent catheter-related bloodstream infections by consistently delivering a five-part “bundle” of care, including measures such as improved hand hygiene;
4. Prevent surgical site infections by reliably delivering the correct antibiotics, maintaining patient glucose levels and avoiding shaving hair at the surgical site; and
5. Prevent ventilator-associated pneumonia by implementing five specific steps, including measures as simple as elevating the head of the hospital bed by 30 degrees.

“It is truly exciting to see an insurer such as CareFirst, a quality organization such as Delmarva, and health care providers come together to focus on these critical quality efforts,” Dr. Berwick said.  “Partnerships such as this one will help in rapidly putting these potentially life-saving changes into practice.”

About Delmarva Foundation
Delmarva Foundation is a national, not-for-profit organization dedicated to improving healthcare quality in over 20 states. Since 1973, Delmarva has assisted in improving care in hospitals, nursing homes, home health agencies, medical practices and health plans. Delmarva performs quality improvement, quality assurance, utilization review, external quality review and Program Safeguard activities. The company's corporate headquarters are located in Easton, Maryland with other offices in Baltimore, Maryland; Washington, DC; Columbia, South Carolina; Tampa, Florida; and Tallahassee, Florida. For more information, please visit Delmarva Foundation on the web at www.delmarvafoundation.org.

About CareFirst
In its 70th year of service, CareFirst, an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, is a not-for-profit health care company which, through its affiliates and subsidiaries, offers a comprehensive portfolio of health insurance products and administrative services to more than 3.3 million individuals and groups in Northern Virginia, the District of Columbia, Maryland and Delaware. Through its CareFirst Commitment initiative and other public mission activities, CareFirst supports efforts to increase the accessibility, affordability, safety and quality of health care throughout its market areas.