About
Fran Griffin has worked in health care for over 25 years, particularly in areas of patient safety, quality improvement and high reliability. Fran was part of the initial team at the CMS Innovation Center from 2012-2016 where she launched and lead the Innovation Advisors Program and served as a senior advisor to innovation models.
Fran is co-developer of the Global Trigger Tool and an author on numerous articles and white papers related to patient safety and quality improvement in health care. She authored “Patient Safety and Medical Errors,” a chapter in The Healthcare Quality Book: Vision, Strategy, and Tools (3rd edition).
She has been faculty with the Institute for Healthcare Improvement since 2000 and was full-time staff for eight years, directing patient safety, infection prevention and reliability projects and collaboratives in the USA and around the world.
Fran is a Registered Respiratory Therapist with a Master’s degree in Public Administration and experience in the hospital setting including oversight for quality, case management, infection prevention, emergency preparedness and related departments.
CURRENT ROLES
Fran consults and works with a variety of various organizations to drive clinical quality improvement and to increase skills and capabilities of clinicians and health care managers. She has led multiple, successful improvement collaboratives, presents frequently at conferences and on webinars and has both developed and delivered many quality improvement training and development programs. Fran’s programs and presentations consistently receive very favorable reviews.
Fran serves as improvement advisor to the NJ Academy of Family Physicians and works with hospitals, health systems and professional organizations.
Learning about safety & reliability from other industries
Fran partners with colleagues in other industries to learn strategies that can be applied to health care – such as Universal Studios Orlando and Marriott hotels.
EXPERIENCE
Training & Professional Development
Fran has developed and served as faculty in programs designed to support clinical staff and leaders. Programs focus on high reliability, patient safety, quality improvement and developing skills of participants as they apply proven methods to improve patient care. Examples include:
CMS Innovation Advisors Program
This groundbreaking program was one of the first initiatives of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation with a goal to develop a national cadre of frontline clinicians and professionals to drive local quality transformation and support spread of innovation models. Many participants have advanced to other leadership roles since this program, which Fran developed and directed.
The Science of Quality: Using Methods and Tools to Improve Care
Fran developed and taught this web-based course for the New Jersey Hospital Association. The course ran for 22 weeks and focused on basic QI methods and tools. Over 100 participants enrolled and many worked on improvement projects during the course.
View Program Brochure
Improvement Leadership Program
Fran was recruited to develop and direct this program to build local capability for Hamad Healthcare Quality Institute, based at the largest healthcare system in Qatar. Fran designed the program structure and content, served as faculty, coordinated the US and Qatari faculty team and mentored local staff on program planning management for transition to their team. In 2019, HHQI was awarded the HMC Star of Excellence Award for education and attributed this program as a main factor for this recognition.
View ILP poster presented at 2019 IHI National Forum
Fran has also provided training for:
- American College of Physicians NJ Chapter
- The American Hospital Association Health and Education Resources Trust
- The Health Roundtable, Australia
- Infectious Disease Society of America
- The Institute for Healthcare Improvement
- Ministry of Health and Care Services, Norway
- Rutgers University
- University of North Texas Patient Safety Institute
Fran has directed, advised and served as faculty for numerous quality improvement projects related to patient safety, infection prevention and diabetes prevention.
Improvement Advisors (IA) provide a key role in collaboratives and projects – advising the team and assisting with design towards achieving results. Advisors also provide training on QI to participants and coach on application of methods and tools.
Fran serves as an IA for the NJ Academy of Family Physicians on projects to:
• Improve vaccination rates
• Increase identification of pre-diabetics
• Refer diabetics and pre-diabetics to lifestyle change programs
• Improveoutcomes for Type 2 diabetics
Fran has also served as an Improvement Advisor at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement.
Breakthrough Series Collaboratives
Fran graduated from the first BTS College offered by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement and has directed numerous collaboratives using this model. She has taught and mentored others on its use in the USA, United Kingdom and Australia.
Recent collaboratives directed by Fran:
Prevention & Management of Delirium in Hospitalized Patients, 2019
Provided by Safer Care Victoria (Melbourne, Australia) via IHI partnership
Fran designed this collaborative and directed it from November 2018 through December 2019.
Participants achieved early indications of improvement in 10 months with 2 improving outcomes.
Florida Asthma and Tobacco Cessation Learning and Action Network, 2017-18
Conducted by the National Institute for Children’s Health Quality and sponsored by the Florida Department of Health this collaborative focused on asthmatic children on Medicaid. This collaborative was conducted primarily using web-based technology and a final, in-person meeting. The goal to reduce ED visits by 10% in 12 months was achieved.
Read here about how one plan learned to use home visits during this collaborative.
Quality and Patient Safety Improvement Programme
Provided by the National Health Service South West in the United Kingdom this collaborative implemented a comprehensive hospital patient safety program across 18 hospital trusts starting in 2009. Fran initially directed this programme while mentoring a local director and IA during 2009- 2010.
Fran directed multiple improvement collaboratives for the Institute for Healthcare Improvement from 2002 – 2010 on topics such as
• Adverse Drug Events
• Hospital Acquired Infections
• Avoidable Emergency Department Visits
• Surgical Complications
• Surgical Site Infection
Fran was faculty for the IHI 100k Lives & 5 Million Lives Campaigns which applied many collaborative methods to achieving improvements to clinical care with over 4000 US hospitals.
Practical Improvement Tools
Fran’s interest is around practical tools that can be applied easily in the clinical setting to drive improvement. Two tools that Fran is proud to have helped develop are:
Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA) Interactive Tool
Fran worked with the IT team at IHI to create this interactive FMEA tool which has been used by thousands and she authored this PDF tool.
Hospital Inpatient Waste Identification Tool
Developed through testing and innovation by Fran and colleague Dr. Roger Resar
Fran is one of the leading experts in this methodology and trains clinicians around the world in its use. She has used the tool herself and reviewed hundreds of medical records.
In 2010, Fran and her colleagues published a landmark paper in Health Affairs demonstrating that adverse events were higher than previously estimated. This study demonstrated that the trigger method identifies more harm than other traditional methods.
The Office of Inspector General at the US Department of Health & Human Services was commissioned to assess adverse events experienced by hospitalized Medicare beneficiaries. Their pilot study confirmed that the trigger method identified more harm than other methods and was subsequently used for the report to the US Congress. Fran trained the reviewers for these studies.
Fran was part of the team at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement that developed and tested IHI’s first trigger tool on adverse drug events. She and Dr. David Classen then developed a Surgical Trigger Tool followed by the Global Trigger Tool for measuring harm across an inpatient hospital in collaboration with additional colleagues. Fran continues to work with Dr. Classen on automated measurement of harm using triggers in EHRs.
Fran has trained clinicians in use of Trigger Tools from the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Norway, Qatar, Sweden and the United Kingdom.
PUBLICATIONS
Measuring Patient Safety in Real Time: An Essential Method for Effectively Improving the Safety of Care with David Classen & Donald Berwick
Watch video about this paper and work by Don Berwick
Global Trigger Tool study in April 2011 Health Affairs issue focused on 10 years since Crossing the Quality Chasm
