[Quality management in medical rehabilitation--a comparison of national and international approaches].
The paper presents an integrated quality management program that is being run in acute-care hospitals and rehab facilities in Germany and in the U.S.. The experiences gained through all commonly implemented quality management concepts have been incorporated; which has allowed the development of comparison and integration tools. The overall experience indicates that the contents of good quality management are fairly independent of the concept applied and uniform as to their core. By using an integrated Quality Report, accreditation can be achieved while striving for excellence. The experiences gained through the KTQ Pilot Phase, the QMK Field Phase, and Joint Commission applications in Germany as well as in the hospitals of Pacific Health in the U.S. were incorporated. The sum total of experiences with more than 100 projects indicates that it is easy to combine two or more assessment models in such a manner as to reap the benefits of the models without incurring the expense of the extra work involved. The author recommends that German rehab facilities engage in quality assessment as soon as possible. Owing to insufficient clinical parameters in Baldrige and EFQM, crosswalk complementation with clinical evaluation instruments such as Joint Commission or KTQ and QMK is advisable.
Paeger
Axel
A
ASKLEPIOS Kliniken GmbH, Deutschland und Pacific Health Corporation, USA. Dr.Paeger@gmx.de
D005060:Europe; D005858:Germany; D006801:Humans; D007391:International Cooperation; D007591:Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations; D012046:Rehabilitation / Q000592:standards*; D014481:United States