title: Improving the quality of quality improvement projects.
abstract: As the stakes grow for evaluating the quality of health care delivery, so too should greater attention be paid to the integrity of the design, conduct, and inferences made from QI projects. QI projects that seek to make inferences, especially public inferences, about the impact of an intervention to improve quality of care should be rigorously designed and evaluated, and limitations and potential biases transparently reported to understand how they may affect the conclusions suggested by the project. Our patients deserve nothing less.
authors.affiliation: Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine, Quality & Safety Research Group, Baltimore, USA. sberenh1@jhmi.edu
authors.forename: Sean M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Berenholtz
authors.forename: Dale M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Needham
authors.forename: Lisa H
authors.initials: LH
authors.lastname: Lubomski
authors.forename: Christine A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Goeschel
authors.forename: Peter J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Pronovost
mesh_terms: D003625:Data Collection / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D019300:Medical Errors / Q000517:prevention & control; D058996:Quality Improvement / Q000592:standards*; D012107:Research Design / Q000592:standards*; D017751:Safety Management