The Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) continues to strive for excellence, demonstrated by achieving ‘Gold’ level accredited status in June 2023 in its second accreditation cycle with Accreditation Canada. During this assessment the institution satisfied approximately 91% of the safety standards overall which led the ‘Gold’ level of accreditation. The accreditation programme is divided into three levels Gold, Platinum, and Diamond. Each level signifies competence in a tailored step by step approach to accreditation and quality improvement.
Gold: Addresses basic structures and processes linked to the foundational elements of safety and quality improvement.
Platinum: Builds on the elements of quality and safety and emphasizes key elements of client-centered care and the involvement of clients and staff in decision-making.
Diamond: Focus on achieving quality by monitoring outcomes using evidence and best practice to improve services.
Accreditation is a journey that focusses on all the required elements to promote patient safety such as staff training on key topics like service excellence, effective communication, and Infection prevention and control. Other aspects of the accreditation programme ensures that the institution maintains current documentation of policies, plans and frameworks that guide and govern the staff’s practices that sets the tone for a patient safety culture, the efficient management of financial and human resources and using data to drive decision making.
The accreditation cycle 2023 – 2026 emphasizes People-Centered Care (PCC) as the way to provide care because this model of care has proven to produce better patient outcomes. PCC is a mindset of providing care with someone and not to or for them. The QEH embraces PCC as a model of care delivery and uses accreditation as the tool to help guide our activities as it matures to a full PCC delivery model.
Engaging in accreditation provides benefits for the institution such as:
- promotes capacity building, professional development and organizational learning as the accreditation process itself highlight practices that were working well and areas where we need to improve.
- Enhances the institutions understanding of the continuum of care and the value of a team when providing care to our patients.
- Improves patient outcomes because of the improvement in operational effectiveness and a well-defined vision for sustainable quality improvement initiatives.
The Board and Management of the QEH recognizes that quality improvement is an important and ongoing process to ensure patients experience positive care interactions and good care outcomes. The QEH continues to strive for excellence through accreditation to deliver the standard of care that matches the patients’ and their families’ expectations.