ALEXANDRIA, Va. – American Society of Clinical Oncology, Inc. (ASCO®) announced today that the Contemporary Oncology Team of Athens, Greece as part of the new international pilot project, is the first international practice to receive Quality Oncology Practice Initiative (QOPI®) certification through  QOPI Certification Program, LLC (QCP).

“Achieving QOPI certification demonstrates a practice’s commitment to quality and safety excellence in the care they deliver to patients,” said Carolyn Hendricks, M.D., chair of the QOPI® Certification Program Oversight committee. “The Contemporary Oncology Team has broken new ground as the first international practice to achieve QOPI® Certification status and we congratulate them on this achievement.”

QOPI® is a voluntary self-assessment and improvement program launched by ASCO® in 2006 to assist hematology-oncology and medical oncology practices assess the quality of the care they provide to patients. Through the QOPI® program, practices abstract data from patients’ medical records up to twice per year and enter this information into a secure database. More than 900 oncology practices have registered for the QOPI® program.  

The QOPI Certification Program was launched in January 2010, and more than 300 practices are currently certified. This oncology specialty certification for outpatient oncology practices is the first program of its kind in the United States. Oncologists achieve certification by participating in a voluntary comprehensive site assessment against clearly specified standards that are consistent with national guidelines.  The QOPI® Certified seal designates those practices that successfully met the standards and objectives of the QOPI Certification Program, which includes scoring above the threshold on the key QOPI quality measures and meeting chemotherapy safety standards established by ASCO and the Oncology Nursing Society (ONS). 

QOPI® analyzes individual practice data and compares these to more than 160 evidence-based and consensus driven quality measures. The practice information is then provided in reports to participating practices.  Individual practices are able to compare their performance scores to data from other practices across the country. Based on this feedback, physicians and practices are able to identify areas for improvement.  

To become certified, practices have to submit an evaluation of their entire practice and documentation of concordance to the standards. The QOPI® Certification Program staff and Oversight Committee members then verify through on-site inspection that the evaluation and documents are correct and the practice has met the core standards in areas of treatment, including:

• treatment planning;
• staff training and education;
• chemotherapy orders and drug preparation;
• patient consent and education;
• safe chemotherapy administration;
• monitoring and assessment of patient well-being.

In 2013, QOPI® was opened to include international participation and the Contemporary Oncology Team was among the first to register for QOPI outside of the United States.

The QOPI Certification Program launched a pilot project in 2015 to enable ASCO and QCP to explore the feasibility of expanding the QOPI Certification Program in Greece. The pilot project allowed QCP to establish a certification that adapted to the different health care and regulatory environments, while maintaining the QOPI® Certification Program’s high standards of excellence and meeting the needs of patients and physicians. ASCO and QCP will continue to explore the best path forward for expanding the QOPI Certification Program in Greece and around the world.

ASCO and QCP are dedicated to innovative quality improvement. For more information, please visit instituteforquality.org/qopi-qcp.

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