This past spring, I was sitting in a reception area at the Scottish Ministry of Health. On the wall next to me was a poster on which the indicators by which the Ministry was going to be judged were clearly outlined. I was so surprised that I literally got up from my chair to get …
Although there is lots of talk about making measures of health system performance available to the public, the reality often falls short of the aspirations. Not only are these measures often difficult for public users to understand and access; evidence suggests that they have little impact. In April of this year, the Canadian Institutes of Health …
Recent media reports have highlighted the problem of neglect in nursing homes. Reports from the long-term care sector, in response, have focused on how the quality of care in nursing homes could be improved. However, measuring the quality of nursing home care can be a challenge. Rob Sargeant is a general internist at St. Michael’s …
A recent report describes how Canada’s healthcare system performs compared to 13 other countries. Canada ranked at the bottom in access to care and use of electronic health records, and in the middle regarding costs and health outcomes. Thirty-eight percent of Canadians felt the system works well, 51% thought it needs fundamental change, and 10% believed …
Hospital accreditation is a process that assesses a hospital’s performance against a set of standards. This process is done differently across provinces and countries. In Canada, most hospitals go through an accreditation process conducted by Accreditation Canada. The accreditation process could be more transparent and provide more information to the public about the quality of …
An integrated, coordinated system of trauma care has been shown to reduce injury-related deaths by improving timely access to specialized care There is, however, wide variation in how long it takes to get a severely injured patient to a trauma centre in Ontario. Trauma systems improve by systematically assessing performance and outcomes. Ontario does not …