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Doris Manz ACute Care

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Doris Manz, Quality Control Officer, Clinique de La Source, Lausanne

What is the greatest benefit of ANQ data for your hospital?

It provides us with realistic, stable and relevant key indicators and thus with a good overview of our field of activities, which is constantly evolving. Monitoring the results over a number of years enables us to identify trends. These are encouraging for our institute. The ANQ data also provides us with a benchmark and communication tool for management and staff.

“The ANQ data provides an important foundation for quality in health care.”

Can you give a practical example of how they are employed?

Being able to add two or three additional hospital-specific questions to determine the prevalence of falls and pressure ulcers is a real plus. This has enabled us to enhance our reviews, for instance, relating to both medication and patient safety.

How are the findings integrated into your quality management system?

It is essential not to view the ANQ statistics in isolation. They are always linked to other indicators that are employed internally, such as our CIRS and our reviews of patient satisfaction that we combine with our ANQ survey, as well as measures to evaluate postoperative wound infections.

Using the ANQ data, we can supplement and refine our results. For instance, with the help of the ANQ data we can identify aspects that require improvement. It is also important for us to communicate the results, to inform our health teams about them and to raise their awareness of the quality-related issues. That is the practical benefit of our quality analysis.

“Good ANQ results and, above all, satisfied patients are a success that we can all celebrate.”

Do the results have a resonance within your hospital?

Yes. In various ways. Take wound infections, for example. The Swissnoso results, which are very precise, are processed by our specialist in HPCI*. The findings are then discussed in an HPCI committee headed by the responsible infectiologist. This helps us to optimize pre-, peri- and postoperative processes. (*HPCI = hygiene, prevention and infection control)

As a further example, we’ve introduced an additional page designed for the prevention of falls in our digital patient records that allows us to ask patients about potential fall risk and note the corresponding information immediately on their admission.

How would you personally rate the success of the ANQ measurements?

In the last ten years our hospital has achieved very good ANQ results. I take great satisfaction in communicating the findings to our managers and employees. I share the sense of achievement with all those in our institution who are committed to contributing to patient well-being.

How much work is involved in collecting the data?

Personnel responsible for recording data are required to undergo regular training and master various IT programs. They must be continually available to record data and also be extremely rigorous when it comes to accuracy. This applies both to the analysis and the monitoring of recorded data, which we send to the ANQ institutes responsible for evaluation.

The challenge is to free up the necessary resources, for instance for training, data collection, reviews, preparation and communication of results, and the optimization of our logistics. For an institution of our size, that's a considerable workload.

What improvements would you like ANQ to make?

It is true that the time between data collection and receiving the first results has been reduced. It is evident that ANQ is working hard to speed things up. However, there is still a considerable delay before we can integrate the results into care, for example with regard to re-hospitalization rates.

I find the reports complex and sometimes difficult to comprehend. They rely a great deal on statistics, and that makes them a little daunting. I would appreciate a brief and concise summary of the most important findings.

I also think it would be useful if all the survey and evaluation institutes would use a single hospital number. The number could be centrally assigned to all hospitals and clinics through a supplier platform. At present we have a different hospital number for each supplier contact (Mecon, LPZ, Swissnoso etc.), and standardization would simplify the registration process considerably.

“Gathering all the diverse ANQ data is essential and highly resource-intensive.”

Photos: © Geri Krischker / ANQ