{"title":"Driving Quality Forward: A Study on the Utilization of QI Tools by Hospital Quality Managers.","authors":"Senol Demirci, Demet Gokmen Kavak, Yasin Aras, Figen Cizmeci Senel","doi":"10.1007/s10728-025-00538-x","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>There are numerous ways to improve the quality of healthcare services, and Quality Improvement (QI) tools play a central role in this. These tools are essential for identifying problems, reducing errors and costs, modifying practices, generating innovative ideas, acquiring and analysing data, visualising issues, and supporting decision-making. Using them effectively promotes healthcare quality, patient safety, and optimal resource utilisation. Despite the importance of QI tools, the lack of systematic and comprehensive data on the frequency and purpose of their use in healthcare facilities constitutes the main problem area of this study. This descriptive and cross-sectional study examines the frequency and purpose of QI tool usage among quality managers in hospitals across Türkiye. The study population comprised quality managers from 248 hospitals who fully completed the survey. It focused on the use of 18 widely recognised QI tools, including Brainstorming, Fishbone Diagram, Five Whys, Flowchart, Control Chart, PDCA Cycle, FMEA, Histogram, Scatter Diagram, Process Mapping, and others. The results indicated that the least known tools were the Swiss Cheese Model, Spaghetti Diagram, Six Thinking Hats, House of Quality, Mapping the Last Ten Patients, Tree Diagram, and Pareto Chart. Conversely, Brainstorming, Fishbone Diagram, Five Whys, and Flowcharts were the most frequently used. QI tools were primarily used for generating ideas, visualisation, identifying problems, and analysing them. Significant differences in tool usage were observed based on experience in healthcare and quality roles. The findings underscore the complementary nature of QI tools and the need for enhanced training and awareness.</p>","PeriodicalId":46740,"journal":{"name":"Health Care Analysis","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6000,"publicationDate":"2025-08-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Health Care Analysis","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s10728-025-00538-x","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"ETHICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
There are numerous ways to improve the quality of healthcare services, and Quality Improvement (QI) tools play a central role in this. These tools are essential for identifying problems, reducing errors and costs, modifying practices, generating innovative ideas, acquiring and analysing data, visualising issues, and supporting decision-making. Using them effectively promotes healthcare quality, patient safety, and optimal resource utilisation. Despite the importance of QI tools, the lack of systematic and comprehensive data on the frequency and purpose of their use in healthcare facilities constitutes the main problem area of this study. This descriptive and cross-sectional study examines the frequency and purpose of QI tool usage among quality managers in hospitals across Türkiye. The study population comprised quality managers from 248 hospitals who fully completed the survey. It focused on the use of 18 widely recognised QI tools, including Brainstorming, Fishbone Diagram, Five Whys, Flowchart, Control Chart, PDCA Cycle, FMEA, Histogram, Scatter Diagram, Process Mapping, and others. The results indicated that the least known tools were the Swiss Cheese Model, Spaghetti Diagram, Six Thinking Hats, House of Quality, Mapping the Last Ten Patients, Tree Diagram, and Pareto Chart. Conversely, Brainstorming, Fishbone Diagram, Five Whys, and Flowcharts were the most frequently used. QI tools were primarily used for generating ideas, visualisation, identifying problems, and analysing them. Significant differences in tool usage were observed based on experience in healthcare and quality roles. The findings underscore the complementary nature of QI tools and the need for enhanced training and awareness.
期刊介绍：
Health Care Analysis is a journal that promotes dialogue and debate about conceptual and normative issues related to health and health care, including health systems, healthcare provision, health law, public policy and health, professional health practice, health services organization and decision-making, and health-related education at all levels of clinical medicine, public health and global health. Health Care Analysis seeks to support the conversation between philosophy and policy, in particular illustrating the importance of conceptual and normative analysis to health policy, practice and research. As such, papers accepted for publication are likely to analyse philosophical questions related to health, health care or health policy that focus on one or more of the following: aims or ends, theories, frameworks, concepts, principles, values or ideology. All styles of theoretical analysis are welcome providing that they illuminate conceptual or normative issues and encourage debate between those interested in health, philosophy and policy. Papers must be rigorous, but should strive for accessibility – with care being taken to ensure that their arguments and implications are plain to a broad academic and international audience. In addition to purely theoretical papers, papers grounded in empirical research or case-studies are very welcome so long as they explore the conceptual or normative implications of such work. Authors are encouraged, where possible, to have regard to the social contexts of the issues they are discussing, and all authors should ensure that they indicate the ‘real world’ implications of their work. Health Care Analysis publishes contributions from philosophers, lawyers, social scientists, healthcare educators, healthcare professionals and administrators, and other health-related academics and policy analysts.
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