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THE BENEFITS
OF EARLY
MOBILIZATION Stimulates motivation
to recover
Improves mental state and
clarity of thinking
Maintains heart function
Helps you breathe more freely
This information sheet presents
Reduces pressure that
causes skin deterioration
significant benefits of early
mobilization. Additionally, it is
Helps bowel movement
and function
important to remember that early
mobilization is both safe and feasible.
Increases muscle tone and
blood circulation throughout
the entire body
• Promotes independence
Prevents achiness, joint
stiffness and contractures
• Improves outcomes
• Decreases length of stay in hospital
Prevents blood clots
(deep vein thrombses)
• Facilitates returning to work
Graphic: Dr. Nancy McLaughlin / Vigg
financial data across the UC sites. One of the
projects has focused on reducing atrial fibrillation,
a postoperative arrhythmia that can cause stroke,
keep patients in the hospital longer and require
expensive and invasive care. The group has found
that assigning patients to low-, intermediate- and
high-risk categories based on risk factors and
then treating high-risk patients more aggressively
with prophylactic therapy reduces the incidence
of atrial fibrillation more efficiently. Other areas
being addressed by the consortium include blood
conservation, swallowing difficulties after heart-
surgery intubations and protocols for discharge
and follow-up to prevent hospital readmissions.
“The established norms for treatment represent
the status quo,” Dr. Shemin notes. “By querying
our robust database to look for trends and assess
what happens when patients are treated outside the
established norms, we can find ways to improve on
practice guidelines.”
THE CONCEPT OF STANDARDIZING
CARE-PATHWAY protocols to reduce
unsupported variations and improve quality isn’t
new. Nor is UCLA’s leadership in the effort. A
similar movement took hold in the 1990s, with
the UCLA kidney-transplant program serving as
a national benchmark for its ability to produce the
best results with the greatest efficiency through
standardized practices. UCLA’s place at the forefront
of the movement has remained constant. This was
illustrated most recently when UCLA Health was
selected by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid
Services (CMS) as the only academic medical
center in California to sponsor and participate
in the federal government’s Medicare Shared
Savings Program as an accountable care
organization — working with the CMS to enhance
care coordination as a way to provide high-quality
service and care to Medicare fee-for-service
beneficiaries while reining in costs.
What’s changed in the last decade, both
nationally and at UCLA, has been the enhanced
focus on efficiency in the face of growing concerns
about healthcare spending. “We have not been on
a sustainable path,” says Dr. Skootsky. “Society is
telling the healthcare industry that we have to figure
out ways of doing this better and less expensively.
With a standardized, evidence-based approach to
care, we can have a higher level of confidence that
we aren’t utilizing unnecessary resources.”
Wide variations in cost for the same procedures
across institutions, and even within the same
institution, provide strong evidence that new
efficiencies can be achieved. “You can study 20
different surgeons and find that the costs of delivering
“By querying our
robust database
to look for trends
and assess what
happens when
patients are
treated outside
the established
norms, we can find
ways to improve on
practice guidelines.”
U MAGAZINE
29