Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Guide

• Advancing Health Care Transparency: A National Inventory of Tools to Guide State Policy (July 2018) - (New York State Health Foundation USA) 

  Report summarizes findings from a national inventory which examined more than 230 health care transparency tools across the US in four categories: physicians, hospitals, prescription drug pricing, and health insurance purchasing.

• Americans' Experiences with Medical Errors and Views on Patient Safety (2017) - (Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI)) 

  Twenty-one percent of adults report having personally experienced a medical error, according to a national survey. The survey further finds that, when errors do occur, they often have lasting impact on the patient's physical health, emotional health, financial well-being, or family relationships. The nationwide survey of more than 2,500 adults was conducted by NORC from May 12-June 26, 2017.

• BMJ Open Quality - (BMJ Group UNITED KINGDOM) 

  Formerly BMJ Quality Improvement Reports, journal is dedicated to publishing high quality, open access, peer reviewed healthcare improvement work. Articles covering original research, local, national and international QI projects, value-based healthcare improvement initiatives and educational improvement work are all considered.

• CMS Person and Family Engagement (PFE) Strategy - (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), HHS) 

  The Person and Family Engagement (PFE) Strategy outlines key tenets, foundational principles, and values of person and family engagement, while highlighting the importance of collaboration and partnerships to reach the specified goals.

• Call to Action: Preventable Health Care Harm Is a Public Health Crisis and Patient Safety Requires a Coordinated Public Health Response - (National Patient Safety Foundation (NPSF) USA) 

  Framework outlines a public health approach to patient safety, including event surveillance and reporting, promoting behavior change, and evidence-based interventions.

• Clinician Well-Being Knowledge Hub - (National Academy of Medicine (NAM)) 

  Site is a product of the Action Collaborative on Clinician Well-Being and Resilience and is intended to provide an easy-to-navigate repository of helpful resources for those seeking information and guidance on how to combat clinician burnout in their organizations and in their personal lives.

• ECRI Guidelines Trust - (Note: This resource replaces the National Guidelines Clearinghouse.) "[The] ECRI Guidelines Trust™, an interactive guideline portal, puts current, evidence-based clinical practice guideline summaries directly into the hands of clinicians, researchers, medical librarians, and patients. This publicly available guideline repository was created by the same team that developed and maintained the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality’s National Guideline Clearinghouse™ for more than 20 years.
  • Find concise, summarized briefs for guidelines developed from systematic reviews of the evidence
  • Explore current, evidence-based guidance on a variety of clinical topics from nationally and internationally recognized medical societies and health care organizations
  • Use ECRI’s new TRUST Scorecards to identify how the guidelines stack up against the Institute of Medicine standards for trustworthiness." -ECRI Institute
• Engagement in Health Research Literature Explorer - (Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) USA) 

  A searchable list of articles related to engagement in research, organized around: papers describing engagement experiences; papers on research findings that also report on engagement; studies of engagement practices; and other works that guide the field, including frameworks, conceptual models, and editorials.

• Guide to Patient and Family Engagement in Hospital Quality and Safety - (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), HHS) 

  The Guide focuses on four primary strategies for promoting patient/family engagement in hospital safety and quality of care.

• Harnessing Evidence and Experience to Change Culture: A Guiding Framework for Patient and Family Engaged Care - (National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM)) 

  A white paper and associated framework with evidence-based strategies that facilitate patient and family engagement and are tied to research findings revealing improved patient care and outcomes.

• Health Care Quality Measurement: The National Quality Forum Has Begun a 4-Year Contract with HHS - (U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) USA) 

  GAO's July 2010 report to Congressional Committees with a focused review on the status of the National Quality Forum's (NQF) work related to the five Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act of 2008 (MIPPA) duties as of the end of the first contract year, January 13, 2010.

• Health IT Enabled Quality Improvement: A Vision to Achieve Better Health and Health Care (2014) - (Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC), HHS) 

  ONC has issued a vision paper which outlines their ten-year vision for health IT enabled quality improvement.

• Health Indicators: a 4-Part Webinar Series - (National Information Center on Health Services Research and Health Care Technology (NICHSR), NLM) 

  Recorded webinar series that provides an overview of health indicators, an in-depth review of a county-level indicator project, practical approaches in using health indicator data to engage with communities, and an exploration of several important new indicator efforts.

• Healthcare Simulation Dictionary - (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), HHS) 

  This living dictionary provides definitions for simulated healthcare scenarios used to improve patient safety and quality of care.

• Improving Diagnosis in Health Care (2015) - (National Academy of Medicine (NAM)) 

  This book continues the investigation into patient care quality that began with "To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System" (2000) and "Crossing the Quality Chasm: A New Health System for the 21st Century" (2001) with an examination of diagnostic precision and error.

• Improving Quality and Efficiency in Health Care through Comparative Effectiveness Analyses: An International Perspective (2014) - (AcademyHealth) 

  Using data from Europe, Canada, Australia, and the United States, this paper examines HTA activities and public investments in CER.

• Issues and Challenges in Measuring and Improving the Quality of Health Care: Working Paper 2017-10 - (Congressional Budget Office (CBO) USA) 

  This paper provides an overview of the current state of measuring health care quality, and it uses the Medicare program to illustrate the key issues and challenges that arise in doing so.

• Kaiser Health News - Cost and Quality - (Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) USA) 

  Nonprofit news organization committed to in-depth coverage of health care policy and politics. Link to articles that focus on quality.

• Medicaid & CHIP Scorecard - (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), HHS) 

  Scorecard includes measures reported by states, state health system performance, state administrative accountability, and federal administrative accountability. This first version of the Scorecard also includes information on selected health and program indicators, and describes the Medicaid and CHIP programs and how they operate.

• Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) - (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), HHS) 

  The CDC's primary vehicle for scientific publication of timely, reliable, authoritative, accurate, objective, and useful public health information and recommendations. Content is open access.

• NCQA's Report Cards - (National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA)) 

  Free online resources to help individuals select a health plan or physician that provides top-notch care.

• National Academies Press: Healthcare and Quality Publications - (National Academies Press (NAP)) 

  Healthcare and Quality is a subtopic of interest within the Health and Medicine topic at the National Academies Press. This site displays relevant titles.

• National Impact Assessment of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Quality Measures Reports - (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), HHS) 

  CMS used multiple analyses of measure performance trends, disparities, patient impact, and costs avoided, as well as national surveys in hospital and nursing home quality leaders, to evaluate the national impact of the use of quality measures.

• Patient Identification and Matching: Final Report (2014) - (Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC), HHS) 

  The issue of correctly matching the patient to their EHR is the subject of this report, which includes best practices for patient safety and information security.

• Patient-Centered Care Improvement Guide - (Picker Institute USA, Planetree USA) 

  Founded 30 years ago, Planetree is a not-for-profit organization that partners with healthcare organizations to transform organizational cultures and improve the patient experience; the Picker Institute is an international non-profit organization that supports research in the field of patient-centered care. The Patient-Centered Care Improvement Guide represents the culmination of this year-long collaboration. It reflects the collective wisdom of organizations implementing patient-centered care at an advanced level, as well as the experiences of those whose efforts have been hindered by any number of barriers.

• Priority Areas for National Action: Transforming Health Care Quality - (National Academy of Medicine (NAM)) 

  This January 2003 report recommends a set of 20 priority areas that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and other groups in the public and private sectors should focus on to improve the quality of health care delivered to all Americans.

• Quality Enhancement Research Initiative (QUERI) Newsletter - (Health Services Research and Development Service (HSR&D), VA) 

  Quarterly newsletter containing updates from all QUERI centers as well as citations from recently published articles.

• RAND - Quality of Care - (RAND Corporation USA) 

  RAND Health is a research division within the RAND Corporation, a nonprofit institution that helps improve policy and decisionmaking through research and analysis. RAND Health advances understanding of health and health behaviors and examines how the organization and financing of care affect costs, quality, and access. Access various studies.

• TalkingQuality.Gov - (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), HHS) 

  TalkingQuality is a comprehensive resource and guide for organizations that produce and disseminate reports to consumers on the quality of care provided by health care organizations (e.g., hospitals, health plans, medical groups, nursing homes) and individual physicians.

• The Community Guide (Guide to Community Preventive Services) - (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), HHS) 

  Free resource to help choose programs and policies to improve health and prevent disease in communities.

• The National Quality Strategy (NQS) - (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) USA) 

  This March 2011 report outlines a national strategy for quality improvement in health care. The strategy was called for under the Affordable Care Act and is the first effort to create national aims and priorities to guide local, state, and national efforts to improve the quality of health care in the United States.

• The Physicians Foundation 2017 Patient Survey - (The Physicians Foundation) 

  Report summarizes patient and consumer views on health care, based on a survey of 1,747 adults who had two or more visits with the same doctor in the last year.

• The State of Health Care Quality Report - (National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA)) 

  NCQA produces the State of Health Care Quality Report every year to focus on major quality issues the U.S. faces and to support the spread of evidence-based care. This report documents performance trends over time, tracks variation in care and recommends quality improvements.

• Transforming Care: Reporting on Health System Improvement - (Commonwealth Fund) 

  Transforming Care focuses on new models of care, payment approaches, and patient engagement strategies that have the potential to reshape our delivery system to better meet the needs of the nation's sickest and most vulnerable patients. Published quarterly, the newsletter is a source of innovative ideas for health system leaders, clinicians, and policymakers.

• Using Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) to Study Patient-Centered Medical Homes - (Urban Institute (UI)) 

  This guide looks at the technique of Qualitative Comparative Analysis, which combines theory and Boolean algebra, as a method for analysis of patient-centered medical homes.

  Credit: U.S. National Library of Medicine, HSRIC: Quality

There are two ways to find guidelines in PubMed: Using filters, and looking for articles in which the word "guideline" appears in the title.  

1. Using a Title search
   When looking in PubMed, you can also limit your search results to those that have the word “guideline” in the title.  To do that, add this phrase (using AND) to your search:
   

   guideline*[title]

   
   So your search might look like this: 
   

   CLABSI AND guideline*[title]

2. Using a filter
   This usually returns slightly more than the method above. PubMed has a filter for guidelines. To find guidelines using the filter, follow these steps:
    
   1. Go into PubMed (click the link on the library's home page) and search on your topic. 
      
       
   2. Next, click  on “Additional Filters” in the left column.
      
       
       
   3. Click on Guideline, and then Show. 
       
   4. This makes it show up as an available filter on the PubMed search page, so you need to click on Guidelines again (under Article Types in the left column) when you do your searches.
      
      
      
      PubMed will now return all articles that match the search terms you entered and were also tagged as being a guideline.

There are two ways to find guidelines in CINAHL:  Using filters, and looking for articles in which the word "guideline" appears up in the title.

1) Using a Title Search

If you want to limit your search in CINAHL to those where the word “guideline” is in the title, type the word     Guideline*    into the first search box and change the drop-down box to Title.  Then fill in the search boxes below with your search terms and hit Search.

​

2) Using a filter (this usually returns slightly more than the method above)

To find guidelines using the filter, follow these steps:

1) Open CINAHL and click on "CINAHL Subject Headings.”  On the next pages, type in "Guidelines."

2) From there, click on “Practice Guidelines” then “Search Database. "

3) That will put the search term “Practice guidelines” into the search boxes.  Just fill in the search boxes below with your topic's search terms and hit Search.

​This will return all articles that were tagged as being a guideline and also match the subject term you entered.

These additional resources can be accessed by clicking the links below

Nursing Reference Center Plus Simply type your topic keywords into the search box.  You will get guidelines mixed in with other results.

Other options:

• NIH
• National Institutes for Health and Care Excellence (NICE)
• TRIP (Turning Research Into Practice)