Hospital quality indicators: a systematic review.

Purpose To identify and describe hospital quality indicators, classifying them according to Donabedian’s structure, process, and outcome model and in specific domains (quality, safety, infection, and mortality) in two care divisions: inpatient and emergency services. Design/methodology/approach A systematic review identified hospital clinical indicators. Two independent investigators evaluated 70 articles/documents located in electronic databases and nine documents from the grey literature, 35 were included in the systematic review. Findings 248 hospital-based indicators were classified as infection, safety, quality, and mortality domains. Only 10.2% were identified in more than one article/document and 47% showed how they were calculated/obtained. Although there are scientific papers on developing, validating, and hospital indicator assessment, most indicators were obtained from technical reports, government publications, or health professional associations. Research limitations/implications This review ...