Quality Improvement Methodology

Patient Safety and Quality Improvement as a formal discipline has become widely established, with hospitals and health systems dedicating significant resources to improvement science. Physicians have leadership potential in quality and safety due to their clinical expertise and influence with both patients and hospital leadership. Success in such a leadership role, however, requires knowledge of the fundamentals of how to navigate an improvement endeavor from inception through implementation, analysis, and sustainment. Herein, the authors introduce the formal process of improvement science, discuss basic principles of change management, and provide a summary of the elements of scholarly writing to facilitate dissemination of knowledge across institutions.