According to a recent post on US healthcare blog, Fierce Healthcare, there are eight practical ways to improve quality in hospitals and ensure good quality patient care. Based on a list from the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, these tips could make simple changes to your quality efforts:-

1. Add Quality Improvement to all Board Meeting agendas
   Leadership buy-in is key to improving quality throughout an organisation; include a dedicated time slot to improvement on regular board meeting agendas.
2. Require your CFO to become a ‘Quality Champion’
   Preventable adverse events and readmissions directly contribute to increased costs for the hospital and the overall health system, so why shouldn't a CFO give quality improvement the same priority and attention as other initiatives critical to the bottom line?
3. Recruit popular, respected staff to spread the word
   Choose well-respected, approachable staff members from multiple departments who already show an interest in the initiative.
4. Partner with outside organizations from across the care continuum
   Home care agencies and other community-based organizations share in the patient care initiative and should also be treated as key stakeholders in quality improvement efforts.
5. Gather 'Improvement Teams' to huddle around each adverse event
   For areas that don't already exist, create teams to address specific adverse events. With the support of senior and middle managers, each team should start by identifying appropriate measures and interventions.
6. Set goals and expectations
   Set expectations in iterations, in which new ideas are tested, studied, refined, and retested in days, not months. Keep in mind that the first try won't necessarily be successful. Be sure to set specific deadlines to create a sense of urgency.
7. Measure your results
   Best-practice hospitals not only measure outcomes but also compile results quickly and report them back to improvement teams.
   
8. Make sure your hospital leaders participate in patient safety leadership rounds

Although these tips have been written with the US healthcare market in mind, they are practical, make good sense, and would be applicable to all international healthcare organisations.  When a company looks at improving their quality processes and procedures, they may consider one of the most effective ways to do this - an electronic Quality Management System (QMS).  A QMS will help manage, streamline and centralise all quality and compliance activities. One such system is Q-Pulse, from Gael, this QMS can help you significantly decrease the time you spend on quality and compliance, reduce costs, increase productivity, and, most importantly, help you comply with industry specific standards and regulations.

Implemented in over 2500 companies worldwide across a variety of industry sectors, find out how these organisations use Q-Pulse on a daily basis to successfully manage their compliance needs and improve and streamline their quality and patient safety processes and procedures.