Key strategies for engaging patients in medication safety are education and medication reconciliation. Patient engagement levels were generally low, as defined by a novel framework for determining levels of patient engagement. As more patient engagement studies are conducted, this framework should be evaluated for associations with patient outcomes.

The Standardizing Care to Improve Outcomes in Pediatric End Stage Renal Disease (SCOPE) Collaborative is a North American multi-center quality transformation effort whose primary aim is to minimize exit-site infection and peritonitis rates among pediatric chronic peritoneal dialysis patients. The project, developed by the quality improvement faculty and staff at the Children's Hospital Association's Quality Transformation Network (QTN) and content experts in pediatric nephrology and pediatric infectious diseases, is modeled after the QTN's highly successful Pediatric Intensive Care Unit and Hematology-Oncology central line-associated blood-stream infection (CLABSI) Collaboratives. Like the Association's other QTN efforts, the SCOPE Collaborative is part of a broader effort to assist pediatric nephrology teams in learning about and using quality improvement methods to develop and implement evidence-based practices. In addition, the design of this project allows for targeted research that builds on high-quality, ongoing data collection. Finally, the project, while focused on reducing peritoneal dialysis catheter-associated infections, will also serve as a model for future pediatric nephrology projects that could further improve the quality of care provided to children with end stage renal disease.

The accuracy of application of the CLABSI definition was suboptimal. Efforts to reduce variability in identifying CLABSIs that are present or incubating on admission and in distinguishing primary from secondary bloodstream infection are needed.

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Education expenditures are one of the largest spending areas for state and local governments, and per-pupil expenditures have been growing over time. We examine trends in state aid for education and overall education spending and decompose the existing drivers behind growing state costs. We then explore how predicted future demographic trends will affect education spending levels, as the percent of the population that is of school age falls. We conclude that there will continue to be a large state role in education funding, but demographic changes may lead to reduced political support for schools in the future.