Written by: Center for Care Innovations

In 2015 CCI partnered with The Nicholson Foundation to launch a new cohort of the Catalyst program among health centers in New Jersey.

With a combination of grants and training in human-centered design and innovation, the program focused on encouraging empathy, exploration, experimentation and entrepreneurship. At the end of Phase 1, teams then proposed solutions they were interested in testing and implementing, and some teams received an additional grant, as well as further coaching and support.

When this effort concluded, CCI and Nicholson tasked independent evaluators White Mountain Research Associates to look at the NJ Catalyst Initiative and the solutions developed by the Catalyst teams. In the links below you can explore the resulting evaluation and four case stories of Catalyst team projects.

Launching the Initiative

Initiative Kickoff in New Jersey

Evaluation and Case Stories

New Jersey Innovation Catalyst Initiative 2015 Evaluation

A quantitative look at how Catalyst teams and organizations advanced in their thinking and skills over the course of the program.

Trinitas Regional Medical Center’s Mobile Integrated Health Service

Based on health care utilization data from Elizabeth’s underserved population, the innovation team at Trinitas was interested in exploring the use of EMTs or Paramedics as Community Health Integrated Practitioners (CHIPs) who could serve as the point of contact with these patients. The CHIPs could then guide these patients into a proper care pathway to achieving better health outcomes.

St. Joseph’s Regional Medical Center’s Heart Failure Education Toolkit

“We went back to the drawing board. Our patients were telling us that our current methodology was not at all part of a positive patient experience. We were seeing readmissions, so obviously we were missing the boat for education.”

Hospital Alliance of New Jersey’s 50X Ping

“How do we reduce unnecessary ED visits while connecting patients to the resources they need to be healthy?” The team mapped the evidence using a map of Paterson, NJ (the team’s initial focus for high ED users) to document the distribution of resources for the underserved, “hotspotted” ED visits across the city.

CompleteCare Health Network’s Pathways to Wellness

CompleteCare designed a patient-centered and streamlined pathway for staff and patients to follow to ensure that patients receive important testing and are given their results in a timely and sensitive manner all with the ultimate goal of providing high quality, preventive care that results in optimal outcomes. The innovation team coined this process Pathways to Wellness to underscore the creation of a clear path for patients and staff to navigate health directives and simplify the care pathway in what is typically a complex and overwhelming healthcare environment for both patients and staff.