In early 2008, the State of Ohio was chosen as one of nine states to participate in the Commonwealth Fund/ AcademyHealth State Quality Improvement Institute (SQII) - an intensive, competitively-selected effort to help states plan and implement concrete action plans to improve health system performance across targeted quality indicators. States were selected based on having the commitment, leadership, and resources necessary to build on previous success and conceptualize and implement substantive new quality improvement efforts. In Ohio, this included factors such as the Governor’s focus on achieving a healthy Ohio, an interest on the part of the legislature in addressing concerns about cost and quality, a strong desire on the part of a variety of stakeholders to address systemic issues beyond health insurance coverage, and a number of local initiatives related to improving quality.

In June 2008, the SQII Core Team traveled to Chicago for the State Quality Improvement Institute Kick-Off Meeting. After intensive meetings with national experts, the Team decided that it made sense to pull together a diverse group of stakeholders in the state to develop a portfolio of health quality improvement strategies to which a wide array of stakeholders could commit, offering the opportunity for both short and long term return on investment (quantified in both human and monetary terms.)

To this end, the Ohio SQII Team has organized the Ohio Health Quality Improvement Summit for November 2008. The calling question for participants in this statewide Institute is: What are the top 10 strategies that will transform Ohio’s health care system into a high quality, cost-effective, high performing system that optimizes the health of Ohioans by 2013?