This book presents a series of papers on strategies for promoting quality of care by leading figures in Israeli health care. The papers were commissioned by the Israel Quality Forum. The book also contains summaries of the Forum’s discussions of these papers.
The Israel Quality Forum included leading Israeli directors, policymakers, and researchers, all of whom shared a strong commitment to quality. It was established in 1997 as a cooperative effort of the Myers-JDC-Brookdale Institute, Harvard University, the Israel Medical Association and the Ministry of Health with the goal of promoting quality of care in Israel. In recent years, its main goal has been to engage the leadership of the health care system in exploring alternative strategies for enhancing quality of care.
The Forum commissioned papers on such topics as:
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What should be the role of the Ministry of Health in monitoring quality?
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How can mass media play a greater role in promoting quality of care?
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How can provision of information to consumers promote quality of care?
The papers also explored a range of controversial issues, including the relative emphases to be placed on institution-specific versus multi-institutional quality of care efforts and the appropriate mix of voluntary and mandatory efforts.
Papers were written by Nima Amit, Jochanan Benbassat, Asher Elhyany, Rachel Fleishman, Revital Gross, Boaz Lev, Shlomo Mor-Yosef, Avi Porat, Judy Siegel, Elisheva Simchen, and Leah Wapner.
This collection contains two types of papers: papers discussing quality assurance activities in a particular health care organization or type of organization (hospitals, health plans, and long-term care institutions), and papers addressing cross-cutting themes such as the role of government, consumers, media and medical education in efforts to promote quality of care. The monograph concludes with a postscript, which summarizes recent developments in quality of care efforts in Israel.