Use of statistical process control charts in stroke medicine to determine if clinical evidence and changes in service delivery were associated with improvements in the quality of care

Abstract

SPC charts have the potential to provide valuable insights into the impact of changes in structure of services and of clinical evidence on the process of stroke care. In the present study, the charts were generally well received by healthcare professionals.

Development and Validation of the CPO Scale, a New Instrument for Evaluation of Health Care Improvement Efforts

“…Learning from the final reports of the improvement projects, the sub study indicate that successful results are connected to a clear linkage between vision, aims and proper measurements, clear and understandable improvement efforts, and the ability to communicated this all to others in an understandable way [32]. Our findings support the findings of others indicating that by measuring and monitoring variation and change with control charts, it is easier to understand and manage performance from week-to-week, communicate progress, and motivate colleagues to sustain the improvements [43][44][45][46][47][48].…”

A telephone hotline for transient ischaemic attack and stroke: prospective audit of a model to improve rapid access to specialist stroke care

“…Data were entered into a database written in Visual Foxpro. Shewart Process Control charts 14 were produced using MINITAB (Minitab Inc, Coventry; http://www.minitab.com). We did not attempt to demonstrate an effect of the intervention on patient outcomes such as deaths, strokes, or disability because we would have required a very large, prospective, and randomised trial to do so reliably.…”

On Quality and Communication: The Relevance of Critical Theory to Health Informatics

“…the provision of brain imaging services, decreasing the time it takes to diagnose the cause of stroke and to prescribe aspirin (Henderson et al, 2008). Two signal disasters for British medicine, the failure of the cardiac surgery service for children in Bristol and the murders by Harold Shipman, could have been detected much earlier than was actually the case (11 years for the former and up to five years for the latter) had appropriate control charts been in use (Mohammed, Cheng, Rouse, & Marshall, 2001).…”