Total Quality Management
What is total quality management in healthcare?
Total quality management (TQM) in healthcare is an approach to delivering patient-centered care that emphasizes continual improvement. TQM not only requires striving for accuracy, efficiency, and reliability throughout every level of the organization, but it also requires collaboration among all healthcare providers involved in patient care.
Total quality management involves re-evaluating processes for efficacy and effectiveness as new data becomes available. TQM also encourages the adoption of best practices, effective communication and care coordination among team members, active involvement of patients and their families, and up-to-date training in key areas such as safety awareness and infection prevention and control.
Why is total quality management important in healthcare?
Total quality management practices allow healthcare organizations to remain competitive through using methods such as continuous improvement, professional development, and enhanced customer service and patient care. By applying TQM initiatives, care providers can implement or continue processes that will result in improved patient outcomes. Additionally, using TQM principles can manage the costs of patient care more effectively.
Through process improvement that often results from methods like total quality management, organizations can gain better insight into processes and reduce or eliminate waste of provider time and resources.