Improving Quality of Care through Risk Management Knowledge Transfer and Quality Assurance in Nursing Care

Improving Quality of Care through Risk Management Knowledge Transfer and Quality Assurance in Nursing Care

Kleopatra Alamantariotou (University Hospital of Larissa, Greece)
Copyright: © 2012 |Pages: 9
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-61350-120-7.ch014

Abstract

The purpose of this chapter is to provide innovative knowledge and creative ideas of improving quality of care and to explore how risk management and Knowledge transfer and quality assurance can improve health care. Under careful consideration, our purpose is to summarize which factors improve and promote the quality of care and which factors diminish quality. There are forms of ongoing efforts to make performance better. Quality improvement must be a long-term, continuous effort, reducing errors and providing a safe trust environment for health professionals and patients. After reading this chapter, you should know the answer to these questions: What role can risk management and knowledge transfer play in quality of care? How can risk management and knowledge transfer work together? What are the factors that improve risk management and quality assurance in health care? How does knowledge transfer support, inform, and improve care?
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Quality Of Care Concepts

Defining quality is not an easy process. The expense of quality is an interactive process between customer and provider.

  • 1.

    Quality is defined as the extent of resemblance between the purpose of healthcare and the truly granted care.

  • 2.

    In an economic dimension quality is the extent of accomplished relief case with a justified use of means and services.

  • 3.

    Government and those who pay of the care will see quality as a weighing out between results and costs to fulfill certain expectations in health care (Current Nursing, 2010).

Definition of Quality

The British Standards Institute defines Quality as “the totality of features or characteristics of a product or services that bears on its ability to satisfy a given needs.” It can be translate into “quality is that which gives complete customer satisfaction.

Dimensions and Elements of Quality

Sridhor approaches these dimensions similarly but describes them as elements of quality. He sets out the following elements (Sridhor, 1998):

  • •

    Appropriateness: the service or procedure is what the population or individual actually needs.

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    Equity: Evidence of bias.

  • •

    Accessibility: services are not compromised by undue limits of time and distance.

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    Effectiveness: Staffing levels and skills, Equipment and if services are achieving the intended benefits for the individual and for the population.

  • •

    Acceptability: services are provided such as to satisfy the work expectations of patients, providers and the community.

  • •

    Efficiency: resources are not wasted on patient or one services to the determent of another (Current Nursing, 2010).

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