"I think this really has maybe created a little different way of looking at what it is possible to do on a countrywide basis in health care in terms of quality," said Mo Mulligan, director of performance improvement at University Hospital.

The U. has been using some of the quality improvements for years, often in partnerships with other groups, she said. For instance, the VA and academic medical centers like the U. have paired up to reduce surgery-related infections through appropriate use and timing of antibiotics. It chose not to deploy rapid-rescue teams because of the way the teaching hospital is set up.

That has an impact in community hospitals where a physician is not always available. The U. approach is to focus on seeing that the on-call resident responds immediately and providing intensive care when it's needed, she said.

The hospitals provided monthly mortality data to the institute to use in its calculation of lives saved.

"I think it's good for the hospitals and for everyone to be transparent about what we are doing to improve," Johnson said. "None of us are perfect, and I think it's important to let the public know we are making efforts to improve."

While some small critical-access hospitals didn't have the patient population to participate, nearly all the Utah hospital corporations were represented, including University Health Care, Intermountain Healthcare, the VA medical system, MountainStar and Iasis. The Utah Medical Association, the state's hospital association, physician groups and others all endorsed the campaign.

The campaign is ongoing and the institute hopes that all hospitals will have adopted the suggested practices by 2007.

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E-mail: lois@desnews.com