Aligning Forces for Quality

Aligning Forces for Quality (AF4Q) is the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s (RWJF) signature effort to lift the overall quality of health care in targeted communities, reduce racial and ethnic disparities, and provide models for national reform. Fifteen regions across the country have been selected to participate in this program. In the AF4Q communities, teams of stakeholders representing the people who get care, give care and pay for care are working to rebuild health care systems so they work better for everyone involved. While health care quality is a national problem, health care is delivered locally and fixing it requires local action.

Each of the AF4Q communities has a multi-stakeholder leadership alliance. These Alliances include physicians, nurses, patients, consumers and consumer groups, purchasers, hospitals, health plans, safety net providers, and others. Many of the AF4Q communities have already begun aligning their work with the National Priorities and Goals.

“The NPP Goals provide an invaluable framework for dramatic health system change and meaningful reform at the community level,” said Bruce Siegel, Director of the National Program Office for AF4Q. “We look forward to seeing local communities use the national framework as a model for their local efforts and priority-setting.”

RWJF’s AF4Q initiative brings an unprecedented commitment of resources, expertise and training to turn promising practices into real results on the ground in 15 communities. The program is taking specific actions to improve the quality of health care in communities, including: helping physicians and nurses improve the quality of their care; encouraging patients to become better partners with their doctors;. improving care inside hospitals; and helping people make better decisions about the care they receive. These communities cover 11 percent of the U.S. population, making RWJF’s commitment to Aligning Forces the largest effort of its kind ever undertaken by a philanthropic organization.

To learn more about AF4Q, please visit http://www.rwjf.org/qualityequality/af4q/.

 

The AF4Q communities span coast-to-coast. RWJF’s website offers detailed information on all 15 communities. Learn more about the work underway in each community. 
Who we are

AF4Q is a long-term, comprehensive effort to improve the quality of care on the ground in communities across the country. These communities are positioned to make fundamental and cutting-edge changes to re-build their health care systems. The AF4Q initiative is managed out of the National Program Office at the Center for Health Care Quality in The George Washington University Medical Center School of Public Health and Health Services.