February 2, 2001
Quality Forum's Safe Practices Steering Committee Begins Work
The Safe Practices Steering Committee (steering committee) of the National Forum for Health Care Quality Measurement and Reporting (the Forum) met on Jan. 26. The steering committee will guide the Forum's work on developing a compendium of evidence-based safe practices for all health care settings. The project was inspired by the Forum's May 2000 document "Patient Safety: A Call to Action" which noted the need to implement recognized safe practices that have been shown to prevent errors. The Forum's goal is to have this compendium serve as a guide for all health care stakeholders to recognize, implement, and support practices which improve the quality of care.
During the meeting, the steering committee finalized the project framework. They discussed several issues including the scope of the project and technical issues relating to the definitions of safe practices and adverse events. The framework will serve as a guide to the research group that will review the evidence on several practices. After the evidence review, the research group will report to the steering committee on those practices that met their criteria, and those that appear promising but currently lack sufficient evidence. Based on this work, the steering committee will establish a consensus on a set of safe practices as well as promising practices that need further research. The Forum's Board of Directors and Member Councils will review the steering committee's work and decide whether to endorse it. The Forum plans to have the project completed by the end of the year. The steering committee plans to hold another public meeting in the middle of July or in the beginning of August.
Information: Jeff Patyk, AAMC Division of Health Care Affairs, 202-828-0498.
