==== Front
Innov Aging
Innov Aging
innovateage
Innovation in Aging
2399-5300 Oxford University Press US 

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.855
igaa057.855
Abstracts
Session 2923 (Paper)
Falls and Fall Prevention
AcademicSubjects/SOC02600
Whole-Person, Whole-Team Approach to Quality Improvement: Why Person-Centered Care Matters
Engle Ryann 1 Snow A Lynn 2 Clark Valerie 3 Zhao Shibei 3 Gillespie Christopher 3 Hartmann Christine 3 1 
VA Boston Healthcare System, Boston, Massachusetts, United States
2 
Tuscaloosa VA Medical Center, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, United States
3 
Edith Nourse Rogers Memorial Veterans Hospital, Bedford, Massachusetts, United States
2020 
16 12 2020 
16 12 2020 
4 Suppl 1 Program Abstracts from The GSA 2020 Annual Scientific Meeting “Turning 75: Why Age Matters”267 267
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America.2020This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Abstract
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) began its culture transformation journey in 2006, supporting its nursing homes in providing high-quality, person-centered care in person-centered environments. We implemented a quality improvement intervention to support frontline staff from low-performing VA nursing homes in providing high-quality care using a whole-person, whole-team approach. The intervention consisted of a bundle with four components: 1) specialized frontline staff huddles that encouraged high-quality frontline staff communication and collaboration, 2) micro-root cause analyses and targeted interventions to promote resident sleep and reduce resident falls through individualized care, 3) in-depth frontline conversations regarding residents’ distress behaviors and mobility, and 4) targeted, team-based, person-centered performance improvement projects. The intervention was implemented at 8 low-performing VA nursing homes (August 2018 - April 2019) via in-person and virtual sessions and facilitated through CLC-based champions and intervention team-based coaches. We monitored the intervention’s impact using pre-post Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services quality star ratings. We also conducted 17 post-intervention interviews with key informants at 7 participating nursing homes and conducted a content analysis of the data. Pre intervention, all 8 nursing homes had a history of being 1 or 2 stars in overall quality. Post intervention, 3 homes increased 1 star; 1 home increased 2 stars; 2 homes increased 3 stars; 2 homes increased 4 stars. Post intervention, participants perceived improved delivery of person-centered care (e.g., providing individualized sleep hygiene, de-implementing alarms). Our findings suggest a whole-person, whole-team intervention can effectively and efficiently improve both person-centered care and care quality.