Quick Quality Healthcare
Why quality improvement matter
Healthcare Quality Domains
A holistic approach to guide quality healthcare delivery
WHO define healthcare quality as -
“The degree to which health care services for individuals and populations increase the probability of desired health outcomes and are consistent with current professional knowledge of best practice.”
Healthcare quality, as a generic term, does not provide a clear direction for proactively improving care.
This gap was addressed by the Institute of Medicine (IOM -now the National Academy of Medicine of USA) when they developed the healthcare quality domains in 2001.
This report marked a significant shift in how healthcare quality was understood and set the foundation for systemic reform.
"Navigating Healthcare Quality: The IOM Quality Domains as a Guiding Framework"
In Institute of Medicine (IOM) report, Crossing the Quality Chasm: A New Health System for the 21st Century, the IOM proposed a framework to improve healthcare delivery by focusing on six key domains: safety, effectiveness, patient-centeredness, timeliness, efficiency, and equity.
1. Safety
Avoiding harm to patients from care intended to help them. Safety initiatives focus on minimizing errors, adverse events, and preventable harm.
2. Timely
Reducing unnecessary waits and delays for both patients and providers. Timeliness improves access to care and prevents complications caused by delayed diagnoses and interventions.
3. Effective
Providing services based on scientific knowledge and avoiding underuse or overuse. Effectiveness ensures treatments align with best practices and achieve the intended outcomes.
4. Efficient
Using resources wisely to avoid waste, including time, materials, and finances. Efficiency initiatives often focus on streamlining workflows and reducing redundancies.
5. Equitable
Ensuring care does not vary in quality due to personal characteristics such as race, ethnicity, gender, or socioeconomic status. Equity promotes fairness and inclusivity in healthcare delivery.
6. Patient centered
Respecting and responding to individual patient preferences, needs, and values. Patient-centered care emphasizes communication, shared decision-making, and empathy.
Healthcare quality domains provide a structured framework for policy and practice improvements, driving better care delivery at all levels. The IOM’s systems-based approach continues to shape global healthcare, emphasizing continuous improvement, patient outcomes, experience, and the reduction of inefficiencies and disparities.