Quality and Risk Management

Quality improvement activities have existed throughout the MICs Group of Health Services for many years. In the past, responsibility for assessing, planning, implementing, monitoring, managing, and reporting of these activities have fallen to individual teams or in some cases, individual people. In 2009, MICs enhanced quality improvement by introducing a Director of Quality, Risk and Patient Safety to its Senior Management Team, and adopting a Quality Framework to provide a structure for establishing and maintaining an organizational culture of quality improvement by identifying and following through with quality ideas and activities. This framework articulates the key components, processes and mechanisms to achieving quality and risk management.

Central to this framework is the development of an annual quality, patient safety and risk management plan which outlines the corporate quality goals for each year. The MICs Quality and Risk Management Committee is responsible for the development of the annual plan in collaboration with the MICs Board of Directors.

The Quality and Risk Management Committee's mandate is to:

• Work with the Board in setting the quality improvement plan annually;
• Report progress of the plan to the Board on a quarterly basis;
• Create a culture of commitment to quality and patient safety through the integration of quality efforts that includes patient safety and risk management;
• Monitor the quality of care provided to patients and residents and their families at all MICs sites;
• Ensure processes are in place to manage risk including prevention, protection and identifying potential risks and focus on risk minimization and prevention; and
• Promote the evolution of a culture of safety.

Risk Management, which is an integral component of Quality Improvement, is a process by which risks that have caused or may cause harm are identified, assessed, managed, and evaluated on an ongoing basis to ensure the provision of high quality care and service within a safe environment. The objectives of Risk Management are to:

• Prevent risks of any type from occurring;
• Reduce the occurrence and consequences of risks that has already been identified.
• Goals are pursued by identifying risk trends, evaluating the frequency and severity of risks, conducting audits, ensuring appropriate and timely actions are taken, and communicating risk management information to all levels of hospital staff.

Improving the quality of care for patients and their families is an ongoing commitment managed through various committees, working groups and teams. Departments, services, and teams continually look for quality initiatives through the Plan-Do Study-Act-Model.