Rep. Lewis Commends Kidney Care Partners' Health Care Campaign to Improve Survival Rates of First-Year Dialysis Patients ...( - PEAK Campaign: Performance Excel...),Health

- "PEAK" Campaign: "Performance Excellence and Accountability in Kidney Care" to reduce mortality by 20 percent, extend 10,000 lives by the end of 2012 -

WASHINGTON, June 8 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Kidney Care Partners announced the launch of a voluntary quality improvement campaign pledging to reduce mortality among first-year dialysis patients - those at the greatest risk - in Georgia and across the country by 20 percent by the end of 2012.

The "Performance Excellence and Accountability in Kidney Care" or PEAK Campaign (www.kidneycarequality.org) to reduce mortality in the first year will focus on patient education and key clinical care activities to achieve its goal.

Led by Kidney Care Partners, with support from research partners at Brown University and Quality Partners of Rhode Island as well as experts in the kidney community, the PEAK Campaign will:

• Equip health care providers with tools to help first-year dialysis patients better transition;
• Improve the health and survival of first-year dialysis patients;
• Result in reduced hospitalizations, thus resulting in Medicare savings.

The PEAK campaign has garnered support not only from a broad cross-section of the kidney community but also from policymakers. "This Congress is deeply committed to resolving the fundamental challenges of health care delivery in this country, but we cannot do it alone," said Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), sponsor of the Kidney Care Quality and Education Act of 2007, which included patient-centered education programs and linked reimbursement with quality care - provisions which were ultimately passed as part of the Medicare legislation of 2008. "We need organizations like KCP to target specific problem areas in the c
'/>"/>