Introducing care pathway commissioning to primary dental care: measuring performance.

Area of Science:

• Health Services Research
• Dental Public Health
• Quality Improvement

Background:

• Care pathways are utilized for quality improvement and healthcare monitoring.
• Purchasers of healthcare use care pathways for activity and outcome monitoring, and service commissioning.
• A secondary application of care pathways involves commissioning and monitoring primary dental care services.

Purpose of the Study:

• To report on the secondary use of care pathways for commissioning and monitoring primary dental care services.
• To outline findings from a project implementing a patient risk and needs-based system in three dental practices.
• To discuss the application of process and outcome key performance indicators in this context.

Main Methods:

• Implementation of a system rating patients by disease risk and care needs across three dental practices.
• Data collection from surgery-based clinical databases.
• Interviews with healthcare commissioners and service providers.

Main Results:

• The project demonstrated a practical application of care pathways for performance monitoring in primary dental care.
• Data provided insights into the effectiveness of risk stratification for service commissioning.
• Key performance indicators (KPIs) were evaluated for their utility in assessing process and outcomes.

Conclusions:

• Care pathways offer a valuable framework for commissioning and monitoring primary dental care performance.
• Patient risk stratification is a viable strategy for guiding service provision and quality assessment.
• Attributability of outcomes and strategic quality improvement require careful consideration within these systems.