A quality improvement effort involving nearly 150 hospitals in 16 U.S. communities is boasting reduced readmissions, improved emergency care and better adherence to care standards.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Aligning Forces for Quality began in 2006 with four pilot sites and now has health care partners in communities across the nation, such as Humboldt County, Calif., and Memphis, Tenn. Hospitals participating in the project’s Hospital Quality Network, which started in 2010, took part in monthly conference calls to share best practices with one another and learn to implement strategies shown to work in other organizations.

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