MJA
MJA

Achieving greater clinician engagement and impact in health care improvement: a neglected imperative

Ian A Scott, Jennifer Kallie and Areti Gavrilidis
Med J Aust 2020; 212 (1): . || doi: 10.5694/mja2.50438
Published online: 13 January 2020

Engaging frontline clinicians in effective quality and safety improvement is essential for improving patient outcomes

Health care in Australia faces many challenges. Research suggests, for example, that effective care is underused in 40% of clinical encounters, up to 60% of tests and treatments are not justified by evidence, and misuse or errors affect up to 20% of hospital admissions. These observations call for significant investment in systematised quality and safety improvement (QSI) activities which can improve patient outcomes across a variety of clinical settings. These include reducing surgical site infections in joint replacement surgery, reducing mishaps, complications and mortality during and after non‐cardiac surgery, or improving survival and optimising care processes of patients with acute cardiac disease.

Online responses are no longer available. Please refer to our instructions for authors page for more information.