A Study on Quality Improvement Activities in Korean Hospitals

Background : the hospitals in Korea are in a situation of a severe competition than the past. This situation was resulted from the increase in the number of hospitals and also from the government policy controlling the medical insurance fee. Moreover, consumer's desire for the high quality medical service g\has been significantly increased. Many programs to improve the quality of medical services are being performed in hospitals since the middle of 1990's. Studies up to now reported that more than 10 programs are being performed per hospital in Korea. So far studies have been performed to measure only the number of such programs in a hospital. The purposes of this study are to examine a specific area involved in the programs designed to improve the medical service quality and to suggest a future direction of the such programs. In addition, we hope that the results from this study could assist the programs for the medical service quality. Methods : A mailed questionnaire survey of the QI staffs at hospitals with 400 beds or more was conducted between September 15 and October 30, 2000. Of the 108 hospitals eligible for inclusion in our study, 69 participated, yielding a response rate of 63.9%. Excluding 7 hospital which are not responsed about activities of hospital then 62 hospitals were used for the analysis. Result : The total number of programs was 1,081 from the 62 hospitals participated in the survey. The highest number (24.8 programs) was found in the hospital having more than 800 beds and performing the programs more than 5 years. The 1,081 programs were consisted of 445 from the medical examination area, 343 from the medical examination support area, and 296 from the management area. Conclusion : This study showed the present situation of hospitals in Korea regarding to the quality improvement programs. The results from this study suggest that the pattern of the program for the medical service improvement is being changed to service process and result-centered programs from the structural area.