The organisation of quality assurance in Australian hospitals

A mailed survey of all Australian hospitals, conducted by the Australian Institute of Health in 1987, sought information about quality assurance (QA) activities. Respondents were asked to describe aspects of the organisation of their hospital and its organisation of QA to permit the line of accountability for QA to be traced, from the person responsible on the ward to the person responsible for the overall quality of patient care to the governing body. This paper presents survey findings for public and private hospitals describing this line of accountability and the attributes of hospitals that were associated with an "adequate" range of reviews. It discusses the implications of these findings for the various parties involved in safeguarding quality of hospital care.