Project RED (Re-Engineered Discharge)  

Project RED
(Re-Engineered Discharge)

Project Re-Engineered Discharge is a research group at Boston University Medical Center that develops and tests strategies to improve the hospital discharge process in a way that promotes patient safety and reduces re-hospitalization rates. The RED (re-engineered discharge) intervention is founded on 12 discrete, mutually reinforcing components and has been proven to reduce rehospitalizations and yields high rates of patient satisfaction.  Virtual patient advocates are currently being tested in conjunction with the RED. In addition, Project RED has started to implement the re-engineered discharge at other hospitals serving diverse patient populations. We are also looking at the transitional needs from inpatient to outpatient care of specific populations (i.e., those with depressive symptoms). Finally, we are about to start a patient-centered project to create a tool that hospitals can use to discover factors (i.e., medical legal, social, etc.) in patients' readmissions.

Project RED is supported by grants from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH)-National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHBLI), the Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation, and the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute. The contents of this website are solely the responsibility of Brian Jack, MD and Boston University/Boston Medical Center and do not necessarily represent the official view of or imply endorsement by any funding institutions.

Project RED
Photo: Glenn Kulbako

Click for Project RED Toolkit

Latest Project RED news

The most recent Project RED tool — Tool 7: Understanding and Enhancing the Role of Family Caregivers in the Re-Engineered Discharge — was highlighted in the Care Alliance Ireland Exchange – Summer 2014 Newsletter (page 16).

Click here to download the Newsletter

Now available, the new resource titled Hospital Guide to Reducing Medicaid Readmissions
Medicaid readmission reduction efforts. It helps identify readmission risks, transitional care needs, and adapt best practices from proven strategies like AHRQ’s Re-Engineered Discharge, the Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s State Action on Avoidable Readmissions, and the Society of Hospital Medicine’s Better Outcomes for Older Adults Safe Transitions to serve the transitional care requirements of Medicaid patients. Hospitals at different stages of readmission reduction work can benefit from implementing this guide.

August 2014

BMC Releases Update to Project RED
America’s Essential Hospitals
By Matthew Buechner
June 6, 2014

Announcing new chapter in the RED toolkit: Understanding and Enhancing the Role of Family Caregivers in the Re-Engineered Discharge (PDF) written by Carol Levine and Jennifer Rutberg of the United Hospital Fund and Brian Jack MD and Ramon Cancino MD of Boston University School of Medicine.

Visit the newsroom for additional Project RED articles

© 2014 Project RED
Funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, the Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation, and the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute.