Certificate Training Program in
Health Quality Transformation

The Certificate Training Program (CTP) in Health Quality Transformation is the IHQSE’s most rigorous professional development program. While all CTP teams complete an improvement project, the course is more focused on developing teams that can complete projects than on the project itself. We believe that if we build a strong team, develop leadership skills and focus them on improvement efforts, the team will be well positioned to complete projects in perpetuity. As such, we give priority to those teams that represent dyadic (physician/nurse/administrator) leadership of an ambulatory clinic or an inpatient unit or program.  

Now accepting applications for Cohort 12 (2024-2025)!
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Educational Outcomes

IHQSE programs focus on your development. The educational outcomes for our Certificate Training Program show significant gains in participant knowledge. However, it is the ability to transfer knowledge into skills and skills into outcomes that differentiates the IHQSE. Visit our Performance Portfolio page for a sampling of IHQSE projects throughout the years. We have experience with over 100 project types and can help you apply our templates to help solve your quality, safety or efficiency challenges.

Course Overview 

The year-long course requires approximately 10 hours of team time per month. Two, four-hour classes and two, one-hour coaching sessions per month. The curriculum focuses on leadership, team development, change management, provider/staff engagement, project management, and effective communication. Additionally participants will learn the core tenets of quality and process improvement as well as principles of patient safety on patient safety, healthcare finance, organizational operations, and patient experience. Every core concept that is taught in class is immediately applied to a real-world project with the aid of a dedicated team coach to facilitate successful implementation.

The program places special emphasis on:

1. Selecting, developing, and supporting inter-disciplinary, inter-professional teams skilled at leading change;
2. Enabling those teams to integrate analysis of quality, safety, operational efficiency, patient experience, staff/provider engagement and cost data into strategic decision-making;
3. Establishing the necessary culture and infrastructure to facilitate continuous performance improvement.

Participant Expectations/Responsibilities

CTP is a rigorous 12-month professional development program. The longitudinal curriculum builds on itself and requires substantial in- and out-of-classroom effort. The program requires thoughtful development of a leadership structure, performance improvement strategy, and data-driven improvement work. Priority is given to teams representing units, programs or clinics and two to three partners representing the medical, nursing, pharmacy, and/or administrative leadership. Ideal team sizes are 4-6, however, we accept teams with 2-8 members.  Specifically, in order to graduate from CTP, participants must:

• Attend twice-monthly educational sessions as a team. Participants must confirm with their supervisor(s) that they will be released from clinical and administrative duties from 1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. on the day of CTP (generally every 2nd and 4th Tuesday). 
• Attend regular coaching sessions as a team. These sessions generally occur for 30-60 minutes on the weeks between educational sessions.
• Apply curricular concepts and tools to their clinical area between in-person session.
• Maintain active contact with coaches throughout the course.
• Complete a substantial performance improvement project.