National Quality Forum Announces Publication Of New Report On Nursing-Sensitive Care Performance Measures

WASHINGTON, Oct. 8 /PRNewswire/ -- The National Quality Forum (NQF) announced publication of a new set of national consensus standards today. "National Voluntary Consensus Standards for Nursing-Sensitive Care: An Initial Performance Measure Set" is the first-ever national standards for nursing care. The executive summary of the report, with a list of endorsed performance measures, can be found on the NQF web site, http://www.qualityforum.org/.

The report details quality standards endorsed by the NQF's 250-plus Member organizations through its formal Consensus Development Process. As such, the measures have special legal standing as voluntary consensus standards.

The 15 new standards provide a framework for how to measure the quality of nursing care. They can be used by consumers to assess the quality of nursing care in hospitals and by providers to identify opportunities for improvement of critical outcomes and processes of care.

"Nurses and nursing care are key to quality care, and these measures will help us objectively assess nursing quality," said Kenneth W. Kizer, M.D., M.P.H., President and CEO of the NQF.

The 15 measures are: 1) Death among surgical inpatients with treatable serious complications ("failure to rescue") 2) Pressure ulcer prevalence 3) Falls prevalence 4) Falls with injury 5) Restraint prevalence (vest and limb only) 6) Urinary catheter-associated urinary tract infection for intensive care unit (ICU) patients 7) Central line catheter-associated blood stream infection rate for ICU and high-risk nursery (HRN) patients 8) Ventilator-associated pneumonia for ICU and HRN patients 9) Smoking cessation counseling for acute myocardial infarction patients 10) Smoking cessation counseling for heart failure patients 11) Smoking cessation counseling for pneumonia patients 12) Skill mix 13) Nursing care hours per patient day 14) Practice Environment Scale-Nursing Work Index (composite+five subscales) 15) Voluntary turnover

Support for this project was provided by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

The NQF is a private, not-for-profit, public benefit corporation created in 1999 to develop and implement a national strategy for healthcare quality measurement and reporting. Established as a unique public-private partnership, the NQF has broad participation from all sectors of the healthcare industry. Visit the NQF on the web at http://www.qualityforum.org/.

National Quality Forum

CONTACT: Philip Dunn of the National Quality Forum, +1-202-783-0206, orpdunn@qualityforum.org

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