Toolkits on Quality and Patient Safety

Governance Leadership of Quality: Confronting Realities and Creating Tension for Change

Leadership of quality is a key responsibility of governance and, done well, serves as an exceptional gift: engaged boards produce better outcomes. For all the progress made over the last 20 years, however, many boards, trustees, and executives continue to struggle with quality oversight.

Understanding quality scorecards: A primer for boards

The number of public quality scorecards for hospitals has increased exponentially in recent years as consumers take more interest in getting the most value for their health care dollar. These attempts at simplifying the complex hospital environment into laypeople’s terms often condense hospital performance on a select number of quality measures into a letter grade, star or ranking — much easier for the average stakeholder to understand than risk-adjusted infection rates.

Sample Patient Experience Dashboards

Trustees play a vital role in governing strategy and business operations of the health care organizations they serve. For this reason, it is essential that they understand the importance of the patient experience and how it advances the mission, vision and values of the organization.

Governance Quality Engagement Diagnostic

This diagnostic is designed to help boards and organization leaders identify challenges that may be impeding efforts to improve quality. Developed by Jim Conway, this resource draws on 20 years of personal governance experience as well as learning from the literature and the shared experience of trustees, executives, patients, family members, staff, teachers, and students.