RT Book, Section A1 Bodley, Thomas F. A1 Kajdacsy-Balla Amaral, Andre Carlos A2 Schmidt, Gregory A. A2 Kress, John P. A2 Douglas, Ivor S. SR Print(0) ID 1201798050 T1 Measuring Quality T2 Hall, Schmidt and Wood’s Principles of Critical Care, 5th Edition YR 2023 FD 2023 PB McGraw Hill PP New York, NY SN 9781264264353 LK accessanesthesiology.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?aid=1201798050 RD 2024/10/05 AB Quality is defined as “the degree to which health services for individuals and populations increase the likelihood of desired health outcomes and are consistent with current professional knowledge.”The ability to measure quality is an essential component to improve quality of care.Quality indicators are used to measure performance, and defined as “norms, criteria, standards, and other direct qualitative and quantitative measures used in determining the quality of health care.”Since quality of care has multiple domains, no single quality indicator can define quality.Quality indicators should be sensitive and specific to the process or outcome in question, measurable, relevant, and actionable by patients, clinicians, and managers.Methodological rigor is necessary to avoid spurious conclusions and provide proper interpretation of quality indicators.Public reporting quality indicators and linking quality indicators to remuneration are increasingly common but may have unintended consequences to the health care system.Quality indicators can be divided into outcome, process, and structural measures.Quality indicators based on outcomes are widely used to compare health systems but are not necessarily sensitive or specific to identify outliers and may lead to biased conclusions.Many structural aspects of intensive care units (ICUs) are associated with patient outcomes, but it is possible for ICUs that do not have these attributes to still perform with high quality.When rigorously and objectively defined, quality indicators based on processes of care can be more informative on specific aspects of quality.