Quality improvement in neonatology: where do we stand?

Abstract

The origin of Quality Improvement (QI) comes from industry from the 1920s onwards. Later, it began to be used in healthcare. Although it is applicable in all health areas, in this article, we will refer to its use in the neonatal area, where it has had a growing interest and successful development. The collaborative neonatal QI methodology emerged in the late 1980s with the Vermont Oxford Network (VON) neonatal network. It is noteworthy that initial QI projects arose in high-income countries. However, in recent years, publications have appeared on the implementation of QI projects in low-and middle-income regions, concluding that they have a very high potential to improve neonatal outcomes, especially in preterm infants. The basic premise of QI in health care is that improvements in patient care outcomes can be achieved by making a concerted effort by the entire care team to implement improvements, using a set of interventions based on the best evidence and continuously evaluating the results. The objective of this article is to update the available evidence regarding the implementation of the QI methodology in neonatology, its successful results, and to briefly describe its foundations and methodology.