Richmond, Virginia – The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has awarded a four-year contract to the Health Quality Innovation Network (HQIN), which is lead by Health Quality Innovators (HQI), to serve as a Hospital Quality Improvement Contractor (HQIC) within its Network of Quality Improvement and Innovation Contractors (NQIIC).

HQICs will provide targeted quality improvement assistance to small, rural and critical access hospitals and those hospitals that have been identified by CMS as requiring technical assistance. CMS has directed HQICs to use innovation to drive results and to implement data-driven quality improvement interventions to assist hospitals in ensuring the safety and quality of care delivered to all Medicare beneficiaries.

HQICs will partner with the targeted hospitals to help address needs such as infection control, pandemic readiness and response, a concerted response to the opioid epidemic and patient safety.

Karen Shiner can be contacted at hqic@hqin.org. For more information on hospital quality improvement, please visit www.cms.gov.