Understanding 'Quality' Care:- Signposts on the path to excellence
Health care is about creating "Public Value", which is meeting the desires and perceptions of individuals, expressed through representative government. Our community values safe health care above the other dimensions of quality, which include safety, appropriateness, access, consumer-centredness, effectiveness and efficiency. If we are to meet the communities' expectations, we need health professionals with competencies to support this agenda. Health professionals and health care organizations need measures including audited results of work done in order to understand their performance and the vulnerabilities of the system in which they work. Also needed are tools to help support improved care, including standards, education, guidelines and new methodologies. Good governance of health care organizations is vital to high quality care and in the modern era this is often "networked governance" i.e. mobilised and linked networks of power.
A suggestion to ASUM is to encourage audit for accountability and benchmarking and to invest further in education in the skills, behaviours and attitudes to meet the requirements of the safety and quality agenda