Since the start of the Korean Society of Quality Assurance in Health Care in 1994, QA has improved, but it is time to develop our own policies that are more appropriate for Korean hospitals.
American Quality Assurance policies are difficult to apply ...
Since the start of the Korean Society of Quality Assurance in Health Care in 1994, QA has improved, but it is time to develop our own policies that are more appropriate for Korean hospitals.
American Quality Assurance policies are difficult to apply to the Korean medical community due to the differences in health insurance policies, and hospital structure between the two countries.
Methods : I would like to propose more efficient organization and management of Quality Assurance according to the specific structures of hospitals in Korea.
All of the hospital departments and committees should report to the Quality Assurance office, which in turn should report to the director. I would like to suggest that the current insurance review staff be used for the Quality Assurance office. A nurse should be in charge of the Quality Assurance department. The Quality Assurance department should have three sections : Medical Inssurance Review, QA records for the different Medical Departments, and QA records for the Ancillary Departments.
A staff physician should be the chairman of the hospital QA committee, which should serve as the advising body to the QA Department. The QA Committee should be organized into eight subcommittees so that all departments throught the hoapital are represented.
The current Medical Insurance Review offices in Korea have similar responsibilities to the QA Department : therefore I would like to recommend that the Medical Insurance Review office be changed the the QA office. If there are presently two separate Medical Insurance and QA offices, these should be combined into one office.
Conclusion : These changes would surely benefit hospitals and strengthen the efficiency of both Insurance Review and Quality Assurance.