Indicadores de calidad en patología vascular: estudio piloto multicéntrico nacional

Abstract

IntroductionThere is growing interest in evaluating the quality of vascular care. The quality indicators are the tool to measure this. Different international vascular scientific societies are developing initiatives to monitor the most frequent surgical procedures. ObjectivesThe Quality Group of the Spanish Society of Angiology and Vascular Surgery considered it of interest to begin developing a basic structure of indicators in our Society. To this end, it was proposed to select 4-5 vascular diseases and 1-2 indicators of these processes, thus demonstrating that this initiative is feasible and can lead to useful results to improve the quality of our daily work. Material and methodsSeventeen Spanish Vascular Surgery Units were selected, together with 5 of the most common diseases and two key indicators for each: abdominal aortic aneurysms, peripheral arterial disease, extracranial carotid disease, venous thrombosis and arteriovenous fistulas for haemodialysis. Practice guidelines, consensus documents and published studies of great scientific importance were used to select the indicators (key performance indicators). Through expert consensus process indicators were selected. ResultsThe results showed a great variability between centres, few of them being impossible to quantify, because of the absence of computer databases to be able to analyse them. The specific details of each indicator are fully described in this article. ConclusionsThis report has allowed us to show that the development of quality indicators is feasible, useful, and a valid opportunity to improve. As in other international scientific societies and after this positive experience, we should increase these indicators and create a national database to monitor them.