AHRQ: Guide to patient and family engagement in hospital quality and safety (Dec 2017)

Summary

This guide published by the Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality (AHRQ) is a tested, evidence-based resource to help hospitals in the United States work as partners with patients and families to improve quality and safety.

Content

The guide includes:

• How to select, implement and evaluate the guide’s strategies.
• How patient and family engagement can benefit your hospital.
• How senior hospital leadership can promote patient and family engagement.
• Strategy 1: Working with patients and families as advisors shows how hospitals can work with patients and family members as advisors at the organisational level.
• Strategy 2: Communicating to improve quality helps improve communication among patients, family members, clinicians and hospital staff from the point of admission.
• Strategy 3: Nurse bedside shift report supports the safe handoff of care between nurses by involving the patient and family in the change of shift report for nurses.
• Strategy 4: IDEAL discharge planning helps reduce preventable readmissions by engaging patients and family members in the transition from hospital to home.