title: Development of a set of process and structure indicators for palliative care: the Europall project.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  By measuring the quality of the organisation of palliative care with process and structure quality indicators (QIs), patients, caregivers and policy makers are able to monitor to what extent recommendations are met, like those of the council of the WHO on palliative care and guidelines. This will support the implementation of public programmes, and will enable comparisons between organisations or countries.
  
  
  METHODS
  As no European set of indicators for the organisation of palliative care existed, such a set of QIs was developed. An update of a previous systematic review was made and extended with more databases and grey literature. In two project meetings with practitioners and experts in palliative care the development process of a QI set was finalised and the QIs were categorized in a framework, covering the recommendations of the Council of Europe.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The searches resulted in 151 structure and process indicators, which were discussed in steering group meetings. Of those QIs, 110 were eligible for the final framework.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  We developed the first set of QIs for the organisation of palliative care. This article is the first step in a multi step project to identify, validate and pilot QIs.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anaesthesiology, Pain and Palliative Medicine, Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre, Geert Grote Plein 10, Nijmegen 6500 HB, The Netherlands. k.woitha@anes.umcn.nl
authors.forename: Kathrin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Woitha
authors.forename: Karen
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Van Beek
authors.forename: Nisar
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ahmed
authors.forename: Jeroen
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hasselaar
authors.forename: Jean-Marc
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Mollard
authors.forename: Isabelle
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Colombet
authors.forename: Lukas
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Radbruch
authors.forename: Kris
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Vissers
authors.forename: Yvonne
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Engels
mesh_terms: D005060:Europe; D006801:Humans; D010166:Palliative Care / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards*; D019984:Quality Indicators, Health Care / Q000592:standards*; D011787:Quality of Health Care / Q000592:standards