NYS Quality Corner: Organizational HIV Treatment Cascades

The Organizational HIV Treatment Cascade was developed by the New York State Department of Health AIDS Institute as part of the HIV Quality of Care Program to integrate a public health approach with quality improvement initiatives at individual health care facilities. To encourage a broad approach to monitoring the quality of care provided to a population receiving services within a healthcare organization, the Organizational Treatment Cascade starts by including all people living with HIV who have received any service at that organization during the year. Organizations submit these patient-level data with an analysis of care outcomes, goals for improvement, projects to realize these goals and their plan for involving consumers in the improvement process.

Quality Improvement Profiles

Each year, the Quality of Care Program uses these submissions and derived benchmark data to update organization-specific Quality Improvement Profiles. The Profiles are intended as quality tools to give organizations a data-informed perspective on what approaches might or might not be working to improve HIV care. They include historical data from the organizational treatment cascade reviews and are shared with each organization in an effort to assist them in examining changes in HIV healthcare indicator outcomes over time, analyzing current disparities among patient subpopulations and identifying opportunities for improvement. The profiles also include comments from quality coaches assigned by the Quality of Care Program, information on consumer involvement in quality improvement and a summary of the organization’s participation in peer-learning activities.

We selected the following example Profiles to highlight a variety of organization types in different geographic regions, underscoring how the process supports high quality of care and quality improvement across New York State.

• Arnot Health
• Erie County Medical Center
• Joseph P. Addabbo Family Health Center
• Montefiore Mount Vernon Hospital
• Mount Sinai Health System
• New York-Presbyterian East
• Northwell Health
• Westchester Medical Center

Want to know more about Organizational HIV Treatment Cascades? Email QOCreviews@health.ny.gov