College of Medicine launches Quality & Patient Safety initiative
The initiative will receive $10M annually to drive innovations that will improve patient quality and safety
June 20, 2023 – The UF College of Medicine has received $10 million annually in state appropriations to launch an artificial intelligence-enabled Quality & Patient Safety initiative, or QPSi. The college’s vision is to create an institute that will lead the nation in driving innovations to improve quality, patient safety, health care efficiency and workforce development by harnessing the University of Florida’s unparalleled computational strength in AI.
“This landmark support signifies a trust in us as the state’s flagship educational institution to pioneer a new AI and quality and safety frontier,” said Colleen Koch, M.D., M.S., M.B.A., dean of the UF College of Medicine. “The QPSi represents the next phase of the College of Medicine’s commitment to changing the health care landscape for the communities we serve. It also celebrates the advances and investments we have made over the last two years through initiatives under our strategic plan, from the launch of a custom, leading-edge educational curriculum around AI and the development of a powerful infrastructure for AI-driven quality improvement efforts to the immersion of faculty in advanced training programs on quality and safety and the creation of a network of experts who can spearhead future quality initiatives.”
This initiative will allow the College of Medicine to continue to build upon the work of the entire college community, providing the framework to improve health care quality, eliminate preventable harm, advance knowledge of health care delivery to reduce waste and become a resource for workforce development while leveraging its AI infrastructure.
Key plan highlights for the QPSi include elevating offerings in quality improvement, patient safety, health care delivery and AI applications through a Quality and Patient Safety Academy, a hub that will offer online courses to health care providers in Florida and around the nation. A fellowship program will include experiential work in the health care system; in-person and web-based education on the fundamentals of quality, patient safety and population health; and capstone research projects using AI to leverage large data sets to solve complex health care delivery issues, thereby creating experts throughout Florida for the benefit of patients around the state.
Additional components of the QPSi include a new research center to continue developing an innovative AI infrastructure to advance quality and patient safety research and a biomedical AI passport program to train the workforce in literacy and mastery of AI applications in health care.
Ultimately, by harnessing the unique resources and skills of the institution, the initiative aims to improve safety and quality for patients, lead to greater efficiency in hospitals and clinics, equip front-line providers with advanced tools and skills and define the College of Medicine as a national leader in training health care providers in quality and safety, a burgeoning field with widespread impact.
The QPSi was made possible thanks in large part to support from state representatives and the UF Board of Trustees, with guidance from the university’s government relations team throughout the funding application process.
“The College of Medicine’s dedicated faculty and staff, unparalleled computational capacity and expertise in AI place us at the vanguard of the AI revolution in quality, safety and health care delivery, making this the perfect home for such a visionary endeavor,” Koch said. “I am proud of the work we have completed to get to this point and am excited about what is to come for our institution as we build the future of medicine together.”
