Why use quality management?
To create a coordinated and consistent approach to managing the quality of what we do across the whole health and care system …with the ultimate aim of delivering better population health and wellbeing, better care experience, better value and better staff experience.
The ihub’s Quality Management Portfolio is a portfolio of work offering high-level interventions to support boards and partnerships enhance their quality infrastructure
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What is quality management?
There are three main aspects to quality management traditionally. The Juran Trilogy of quality planning, quality improvement and quality control.
Our exploration of quality management across Scotland showed that for many the quality trilogy felt like a ‘wobbly stool’. Effective quality management requires us to get the balance right across the three legs of the trilogy.
There is a belief that quality control is overly focused on external scrutiny and that there is a lack of effective quality planning. Quality improvement capability is increasing nationally but it requires the other ‘legs of the stool’ to be in place for scale up and spread.
In Healthcare Improvement Scotland we set out to address this need. Building on the Juran Trilogy we created a framework to build a common understanding about what needs to be in place at different levels to ensure effective management of the quality in health and social care.
Building on evidence and our own research we have included additional components necessary to manage quality in health and social care.
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Moving from Quality Improvement to Quality Management
The impact of Scotland’s commitment to quality health and care services can be evidenced through the track record of improving quality, with over a decade of building knowledge and skill in the application of Quality Improvement (QI) methodology. This has led to sustained improvements in outcomes and experience for people receiving and delivering care.
Whilst QI is vital, it is not sufficient on its own to ensure reliable delivery of high-quality care. With this understanding and consideration of the current financial climate and workforce challenges, Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) developed a Quality Management System (QMS) framework that would enable a systematic approach to the management of quality at every level of the system.
This document has been developed to increase awareness and understanding of the thinking and theory behind our QMS Framework.
