Abstract
Audits and quality improvement projects are vital aspects of clinical governance and continual service improvement in medicine. In this article we describe the process of clinical audit and quality improvement project. Guidance is also provided on how to design an effective audit and bypass barriers encountered during the process.
Highlights
Audits and quality improvement projects are vital aspects of clinical governance and continual service improvement in medicine
An audit assesses if a certain aspect of health care is attaining a recognized standard
It allows organizations to continually work toward improving quality of care by showing them where they are falling short, allows them to implement improvements, and reaudit or close the audit cycle to see if beneficial change has taken place
Summary
An audit assesses if a certain aspect of health care is attaining a recognized standard. This lets care providers and patients know where their service is doing well, and where there could be improvements. The aim is to achieve quality improvement and improve outcomes for patients. Audits are a quality improvement measure and one of the 7 pillars of clinical governance. It allows organizations to continually work toward improving quality of care by showing them where they are falling short, allows them to implement improvements, and reaudit or close the audit cycle to see if beneficial change has taken place. Clinical audits are a cycle with several steps: Sponsorships or competing interests that may be relevant to content are disclosed at the end of this article.
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