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Biomedical subjects

D C Kibbe

Publications and source records attributed to D C Kibbe.

14 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1997

A guide to finding and evaluating best practices health care information on the Internet: the truth is out there?

BACKGROUND: The advent of virtually free Internet access has opened large vistas of health care information to those willing to invest a small amount of time and energy learning how to perform searches using browser software. Health care providers, organizations, and professional associations, among many others, publish "best practices" information for both administrative and clinical audiences, making these recommendations among the fastest-growing types of health care information appearing on the World Wide Web. The problem is how to find best practices among the wealth of resources on the Internet and then how to separate the proverbial wheat from the chaff. WHO IS SEEKING BEST PRACTICES ON THE INTERNET? Best practice describes a process or technique whose employment results in improved patient and/or organizational outcomes. Health care providers, managed care organizations, administrators, payers, and policy analysts are all interested in improving the quality of health care and are likely to be customers of best practices informational resources. HOW TO EVALUATE THE QUALITY OF BEST PRACTICES INFORMATION? Once the information is available on the Internet, the problem for the searcher shifts from one of quantity to quality. The best practices information seeker should stop and ask a number of questions about the quality of information, its sources, and the methods used to obtain it. CONCLUSION: The "truth" may be out there some-where in cyberspace, but locating best practices information and evaluating its quality require new skills and patience and time to practice and develop them to the point of efficiency.

Authorship↗
PubMed1994

Integrating guidelines with continuous quality improvement: doing the right thing the right way to achieve the right goals.

Will guidelines reduce inappropriate care in clinical practice? Although expectations are high, it is likely that guidelines are insufficient. Clinical guidelines help physicians to "do the right thing," but fail to address the corresponding issue of how to help organizations, departments, and health care workers do the right thing "in the right way." Attention needs to be given to the context in which guidelines function and the process by which guidelines are adopted in health care organizations. Linking guidelines with the improvement of ongoing clinical and organizational processes is critical to ensure their intended effect.

Adult↗
PubMed1993

Computer software for health care CQI.

The transition from quality assurance to continuous quality improvement (CQI) demands a basic change from centralized to decentralized information management. In CQI, front-line staff can use personal computer (PC) software skills to manage, analyze, and act on process-related information. Information services departments play a key role in this transition by, among other things, selecting software that optimally supports the PC-based work carried out by CQI teams. A review of typical CQI team software requirements and of available PC software suggests that Microsoft Excel 4.0 is a nearly ideal software platform to support CQI teams.

Management Information Systems↗
PubMed1993

Tutorial: using Microsoft Excel for health care CQI.

The transition from QA to CQI in health care calls for decentralized data collection and analysis in conjunction with the use of personal computers to support CQI team activities. In this article, we discuss recent advances in PC software and hardware technology that make possible revolutionary changes in health care quality data management. We also present detailed examples of how to use Microsoft Excel 4.0 as a single software platform to support commonly used CQI tools and analyses.

Computer Graphics↗
PubMed1993

Continuous quality improvement for continuity of care.

BACKGROUND: Continuous quality improvement (CQI) techniques have been used most frequently in hospital operations such as pharmaceutical ordering, patient admitting, and billing of insurers, and less often to analyze and improve processes that are close to the clinical interaction of physicians and their patients. This paper describes a project in which CQI was implemented in a family practice setting to improve continuity of care. METHODS: A CQI study team was assembled in response to patients' complaints about not being able to see their regular physician providers when they wanted. Following CQI methods, the performance of the practice in terms of provider continuity was measured. Two "customer" groups were surveyed: physician faculty members were surveyed to assess their attitudes about continuity, and patients were surveyed about their preferences for provider continuity and convenience factors. RESULTS: Process improvements were selected in the critical pathways that influence provider continuity. One year after implementation of selected process improvements, repeat chart audit showed that provider continuity levels had improved from .45 to .74, a 64% increase from 1 year earlier. CONCLUSIONS: The project's main accomplishment was to establish the practicality of using CQI methods in a primary care setting to identify a quality issue of value to both providers and patients, in this case, continuity of provider care, and to identify processes that linked the performance of health care delivery procedures with patient expectations.

Academic Medical Centers↗
PubMed1992

Continuous quality improvement in the clinical setting: enhancing adoption.

Our ability to involve physicians in Continuous Improvement depends on our understanding of (1) professional norms and behaviors, (2) how organizational structures and systems affect physicians, and (3) basic adoption processes within health care organizations and by their professionals.

Management Quality Circles↗