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A unique control charting software
tool designed specifically for health care. Provides guidance
for those who are new to Statistical Process Control, and flexibility
for the advanced practitioner. |
About QTrendz
As an integral part of AICE, QTrendz plots and prints 7 control charts and 5 run charts to easily meet TJC requirements.
The Need for Indicators
It's difficult to understand month-to-month variation in healthcare
outcomes. It is even harder to explain this variation to your safety,
infection prevention, quality improvement, and risk management committees.
A certain degree of variation can be expected--it's an unavoidable
characteristic of biological processes that, unlike machines, do
not always react exactly the same way to a given stimulus. Treatment
responses will differ even among patients with the same infection
who are treated with the same drugs and cared for by the same healthcare
provider.
Despite this inherent variability, we still need a way to measure
the quality of administered care. We do this by selecting indicators
- objectively measurable facts about a patientıs care (processes)
or response to care (outcomes). We then collect ongoing surveillance
data, usually rates or continuous measurements, pertaining to these
indicators.
The Importance of Control Charts
Regardless of which indicator you choose, your measurements will
have a certain amount of background variability for the reasons
discussed above.
And because of this normal variation, it is difficult to identify
truly abnormal measurements - so difficult, in fact, that an entire
science called Statistical Process Control has been developed to
solve this problem.
Using control charts as its primary tool, Statistical Process Control
can flag indicators that have gone "out of control" and then help
you identify the preventable risk factors or human behaviors associated
with the abnormal event. Only when you are armed with this information
can you focus your educational and preventive efforts at problems
that are:
- Real (not random)
- Preventable
- Cause clinically significant problems for patients
QTrendz Intro |QTrendz
Control Charts 101 (PDF)
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Overview (PDF)
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ICPA, Inc.
515 South Capital of
Texas Highway,
Suite 240
Austin, TX 78746-4305
(800) 426-8015
ext. 224
sales@icpa.net
"QTrendz is simple, fast and not only
satisfies my administration, but makes me look the consummate
professional!"
Nancy Childs
Holzer Medical Center
Gallipolis, OH
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