New results from Australia's largest public hospitals

Does quality management make a real difference to patients?

17 February 2020

The Australian Institute of Health Innovation, Macquarie University, has released results from the landmark Deepening our Understanding of Quality in Australia (DUQuA) study.

DUQuA is an Australia-wide, NHMRC funded research project that focuses on the standards, consistency and outcomes of care in Australian public hospitals. It involved 2,387 participants, including clinicians (doctors, nurses, and allied health professionals), hospital managers, 2,401 medical record reviews and 151 external assessments of the quality of care. 14,031 patients were included.

DUQuA sought to answer two main questions: what is the relationship between strategies to manage quality of care at the organisation and department levels within the study hospitals, and do these strategies make a significant difference to the quality of patient care?

Results of the DUQuA study are now widely available:

International Journal for Quality in Health Care, DUQuA Supplement Issue 32

MJA InSight perspectives article

DUQuA Website

Professor Jeffrey Braithwaite, founding director of the Australian Institute of Health Innovation, said:

While DUQuA is the largest and most ambitious study on quality management to date in Australian public hospitals, and one of the largest conducted internationally, we found no compelling evidence that quality management strategies driven at the organisational level result in better quality healthcare.

Dr Robyn Clay-Williams, senior research fellow at the Australian Institute of Health Innovation, added:

The results of DUQuA will inform the future direction of quality and safety interventions in Australia and internationally.

To find out more, please visit our website: www.mq.edu.au/research/duqua

CENTRES RELATED TO THIS NEWS

Centre for Healthcare Resilience and Implementation Science

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT

Chrissy Clay, Research Outreach Coordinator