How Shared Learning Helped Reduce Delivery-Visit Mortality by 41 Percent

Healthcare organizations face no shortage of complex challenges. Rising patient acuity, workforce shortages, financial pressures, evolving regulations and persistent health disparities continue to test even the highest-performing hospitals and health systems.

Yet no matter the challenge, one thing is consistently true: No single hospital, health system or provider has all the answers. That’s why collaboration is becoming an increasingly important strategy for healthcare improvement.

The impact of a collaborative approach is illustrated well by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Perinatal Improvement Collaborative (PIC), a national initiative that brings together hospitals, clinicians and healthcare leaders to improve maternal and infant outcomes through shared data, benchmarking and evidence-based improvement strategies.

The results have been significant. Over a five-year measurement period spanning October 2019 through September 2024, hospitals participating in the HHS PIC reduced delivery-visit mortality by 41.5 percent across more than 2.6 million deliveries, substantially outperforming benchmark hospitals during the same period. Participating hospitals also achieved greater reductions in severe neonatal complications even while caring for increasingly complex maternal populations.

While noteworthy on their own, those outcomes also highlight a broader lesson: Meaningful improvement often happens more quickly when healthcare organizations learn from one another rather than working in isolation.

Healthcare’s Biggest Challenges Don’t Belong to One Organization

Healthcare has never lacked innovation. Rather, the challenge is often spreading successful ideas quickly and consistently enough to improve outcomes at scale.

In fact, research suggests it can take years for proven innovations to become standard practice across healthcare. Meanwhile, healthcare organizations across the country are often working independently to solve many of the same challenges at the same time.

One health system may be developing a successful approach to managing hypertensive disorders during pregnancy. Another may be finding new ways to improve postpartum follow-up. A third may be leveraging telehealth to expand access to specialty obstetrics care in rural communities.

Too often, those lessons remain confined within individual organizations.

Collaborative improvement models aim to change that dynamic by creating environments where healthcare leaders can share experiences, benchmark performance, evaluate interventions and learn from one another’s successes and challenges.

Rather than asking, “What are others doing?”, organizations can focus on a more important goal: identifying what works, implementing proven practices more effectively and sharing insights that help the entire healthcare community improve.

A Real-World Look at Collaboration in Action

The HHS PIC provides a compelling example of collaborative improvement in practice. During a maternal health panel discussion at Premier’s Breakthroughs conference, healthcare leaders from health systems, public health agencies and maternal health organizations, who are members of the HHS PIC, came together to discuss strategies for improving outcomes for mothers and infants. While their perspectives differed, a common theme emerged throughout the conversation: Progress depends on partnership.

For example, leaders from St. Luke’s University Health Network shared how they are working to identify pregnant patients at risk for hypertensive disorders more quickly and connect them with evidence-based interventions. They also described a remote monitoring program that allows patients to submit blood pressure readings from home after delivery, helping care teams identify potential complications before they become emergencies.

Representatives from the Arkansas Department of Health discussed how they are using community health workers, telehealth services and coordinated referral networks to connect women – particularly in rural communities where access to care can be limited – with prenatal care earlier in their pregnancies.

Other panelists highlighted the importance of data sharing, multidisciplinary care teams and maternal mortality review processes that help organizations better understand where risks exist and how care can be improved.

None of these organizations are taking the exact same approach. Yet each is learning from the experiences of others while contributing its own insights.

That exchange of ideas, combined with shared data and a commitment to measurable improvement, is what allows collaborative models to accelerate change.

Why Some Collaboratives Drive Results

Of course, collaboration alone does not guarantee improvement. The most effective collaboratives move beyond idea-sharing and focus on measurable outcomes.

Successful collaborative models typically combine several key elements:

Data that drives action.

Collaboratives provide participants with standardized data and benchmarking to help organizations understand their performance relative to peers, identify variation and uncover opportunities for improvement.

Shared learning.

Participants gain access to real-world strategies, lessons learned and leading practices from organizations facing similar challenges.

Structured performance improvement.

Effective collaboratives are grounded in proven methodologies that help organizations translate insights into action and sustain improvements over time.

Accountability and transparency.

Regular reporting, peer engagement and performance tracking help ensure organizations remain focused on measurable outcomes rather than simply exchanging ideas.

Together, these key elements transform collaboration from a networking exercise into a performance improvement strategy.

Collaboration Beyond Maternal Health

While the HHS PIC focuses on maternal and infant health, the collaborative model is being applied across many other areas of healthcare performance improvement.

Today, Premier members are increasingly turning to provider collaboratives to address challenges related to population health, physician enterprise performance, bundled payments and clinical research.

For example:

• The Population Health Management Collaborative supports members as they navigate value-based care models and pursue sustainable population health strategies.
• The Physician Enterprise Collaborative brings together leaders to address physician practice performance, provider resilience and market strategy.
• The Bundled Payment Collaborative helps organizations optimize performance in alternative payment models through data, analytics and shared expertise.
• Premier’s Innovation and Research Collaborative connects research-ready health systems to accelerate innovation and clinical discovery.
• The 100 Top Hospitals® Performance Collaborative helps organizations improve outcomes in key quality and value-based care measures.

While each collaborative focuses on a different challenge, they all share a common objective: helping healthcare organizations learn more quickly, implement proven practices more effectively and achieve measurable results.

A Blueprint for Improving Outcomes

The success of the HHS PIC demonstrates what is possible when organizations combine data, expertise and a shared commitment to improvement.

Through the collaborative, participating hospitals had opportunities to learn from one another, gain insights from subject matter experts through educational seminars, evaluate what was working and apply those lessons within their own organization.

As leaders continue navigating financial, operational and clinical challenges, collaboration may prove to be one of the healthcare industry’s most valuable tools.

After all, some of healthcare’s biggest challenges are simply too important and too complex for any organization to solve alone.

For more:

• Explore Premier’s e-book, “A Smarter Way to Improve Performance: Why Collaboration Is the New Competitive Advantage,” for a closer look at how healthcare organizations are using collaboratives to share best practices, benchmark performance and drive meaningful change.