General practitioners uses and perceptions of voluntary electronic feedback on treatment outcomes – a qualitative study

BMC Family Practice

Research Article

Marius Brostrøm Kousgaard¹  Lars Bjerrum¹  Maria Laura Lippert¹ 

[1] Department of Public Health, The Research Unit for General Practice and Section of General Practice, University of Copenhagen, Øster Farimagsgade 5, 1014, CopenhagenKøbenhavn, Denmark;

关键词: Denmark;    Family practice;    Feedback;    Quality improvement;    Quality indicators;    Qualitative research;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12875-014-0193-6

 received in 2014-05-22, accepted in 2014-11-10,  发布年份 2014

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundCurrently, there is a strong focus on the diffusion and implementation of indicator-based technologies for assessing and improving the quality of care in general practice. The aim of this study was to explore how and for what purposes indicator-based feedback is used by the general practitioners (GPs) and how they perceive it to contribute to their work.MethodsQualitative interviews with nine GPs in two regions in Denmark. The main selection criterion was that the informants had experience with retrieving electronic feedback. The data generation was explorative and open-ended and the analysis took an iterative approach with continuous refinement of themes that emerged from the data.ResultsThe study identified two main uses of feedback: i) Administration of a regular disease control schedule for patients with chronic disease and ii) Routine monitoring of outcomes for purposes of resource prioritisation and medication management. Both uses were deemed valuable by the GPs, but also as an additional extra to the clinical core task. All the GPs experienced the feedback to be of limited relevance to the most central and challenging aspects of clinical work understood as the care for individuals. This led to different reactions: Some GPs would use the feedback as a point of departure for broader deliberations about individual patient needs and treatment approaches. For others, the perceived limitations decreased their overall motivation to seek feedback.ConclusionsThe study points to the importance of clarifying limitations as well as possibilities with respect to different aspects of clinical quality when introducing indicator-based technologies to practitioners. The results also emphasize that an indicator-based approach to quality improvement should not stand alone in general practice since some of the most central and challenging aspects of clinical work are not covered by this approach.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© Lippert et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2014