title: An initial assessment of the Veterans Affairs occurrence screening program.
abstract: The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) established a computerized occurrence screening program in its medical centers in October 1988. Data collected from these hospitals suggest that occurrence screening has been a useful component of the VA's overall quality assurance effort; opportunities for improvement were found in 4.2% of all occurrences. When asked to name the three most effective criteria, there was strong agreement among participating hospitals--50% or more of the facilities ranked readmissions, death, and admission within three days of an unscheduled outpatient visit as the most effective. A majority of facilities (56%) named occurrence screening as one of the more effective elements in identifying quality-of-care issues. These findings must be balanced against important limitations of the occurrence screening process; however, guided by the data it collected, the VA has recently made several changes in its occurrence screening program to address these limitations.
authors.affiliation: Department of Veterans Affairs Central Office, Washington, DC.
authors.forename: R L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Goldman
authors.forename: D J
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: Walder
mesh_terms: D003625:Data Collection / Q000379:methods; D006787:Hospitals, Veterans / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000592:standards*; D017146:Models, Organizational; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000592:standards; D015397:Program Evaluation; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000592:standards; D012308:Risk Management / Q000379:methods; D014481:United States