Public hospitals and health systems deliver more than half of all outpatient care delivered to uninsured Californians each year and 38 percent of outpatient care to the state’s Medi-Cal population. These primary and specialty care visits total approximately 11 million visits annually. 

Though just 6 percent of all California hospitals statewide, public hospitals:

• Provide more than half the hospital care to the state’s 6.5 million uninsured
• Operate more than 60% of the top-level trauma and burn centers in the state.

This critical role necessitates continual innovation to ensure patient safety, achieve excellent clinical outcomes and maximize efficiencies. Recently, two CAPH member hospitals received designation by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement as Mentor Hospitals for IHI’s 100,000 Lives Campaign for their outstanding results implementing rapid response teams to treat patients at the first sign of decline, implementing medication reconciliation to prevent adverse drug events. SNI worked with the Blue Shield of California Foundation to encourage and support public hospital involvement in the Campaign, and now these institutions are leading the way. 

Given that public hospitals often operate with very limited resources, it’s easy to understand the need for the development of new technologies and other non-technological innovations that would offer public hospitals and health systems powerful new opportunities to improve the ways in which they foster community health. Toward that end, SNI partners with like-minded organizations to improve quality and efficiency at public hospitals and health systems.

• Patient Visit Redesign
• Specialty Care
• Health Information Technology (IT)