environment and safe contests, care processes,
management of adverse events, and management
of health records.
Could you present us the two/three
expectations that your organisation/country
have today on improving the quality of
healthcare using the experiences and
competencies of patients?
Using patients’ experiences and competencies
along with other components such as
effectiveness and safety of care are essential for
providing a complete picture of healthcare
quality. This is helpful to get a better patient
compliance in the treatment: listening to patient
experience is important for providing an effective
and anticipatory guidance to establish a health
maintenance and management plan to promote
health and to prevent potential problems.
This means, also, that the patients (or designee)
are recognised as a source of control and a full
partner for providing compassionate and
coordinated care based on patient values, needs
and preferences. Moreover, it is important
considering several aspects of healthcare service
provision that patients value highly such as: getting
timely appointments; providing easy access to
information; providing good communication
between staff, patients and care-givers.
In Italy, patients’ representatives are involved
in many working groups and/or projects such as
pain free projects, specific disease projects (for
example, diabetes treatment), health promotion
projects and waiting list working groups. The aim
is to create an appropriate health culture, which
is very important considering the potential
overexposure of patients to health information
that is often fake news.
Quality and
patient safety
are prominent
issues of the
Italian health
policy. National
legislation states
that patient
safety is a part
of the right
to health
portugal
patient safety or the two/three initiatives
in the hospital and healthcare sector in the
past ten years?
Over the last ten years, the strategy adopted by the
Ministry of Health in Portugal included several
structural initiatives:
• The creation of the Department of Quality in
Health in the General Directorate of Health, in
2009;
• The adoption of the 2009–2014 and the 2015–
2020 National Strategy for Quality in Health that
includes the 2015–2020 National Plan for Patient’s
Safety;
• Adoption of the ACSA certification model for the
institutions of the National Health Service;
• Creation of Safety and Quality Committees in all
hospitals and primary healthcare units
functioning as a network with the Department
of Quality in Health;
• Articulation between the Ministry of Health and
the medical association to develop clinical
guidelines and perform audits to clinical
standards;
• The creation of the National Incident Reporting
System available to citizen and healthcare workers,
in 2011;
• The development of the pilot-project “Patient
Literacy for Healthcare Safety”.
The Ministry of Health, through the annual
reports of the Safety and Quality Committees,
monitors the development of quality and patient
safety activities in the national healthcare
institutions. These are: national guidelines adopted
and audits performed in the institution;
certification of healthcare units and institutions;
safety culture assessment; communication safety;
surgical safety; safe use of medicines;
identification of patients; notification and risk
management; prevention and control of
infections and antimicrobial resistance.
Could you present us the two/three
expectations that your organisation/country
have today on improving the quality of
healthcare using the experiences and
competencies of patients?
The main expectations on improving the quality of
healthcare using the experiences and competencies
of patients are:
• To improve patient’s literacy on safe delivery of
care;
• To increase the participation of patients in the
healthcare service provision, as an active team
member;
• To improve safety culture in the healthcare
institutions.
Mr Carlos Pereira Alves
HOPE Governor, Portuguese Association for Hospital
Development
Could you outline the strategy/approach
adopted in your country on quality and
portugal
Total health expenditure as % of Gross Domestic Product (GDP)
Percentage of current public expenditure on health as % of total current health expenditure
Hospital current health expenditure, as % of total current health expenditure
Out-of-pocket expenditure, % of current expenditure on health
All hospital beds per 100,000 inhabitants
Acute care hospital beds per 100,000 inhabitants
Acute care admissions/discharges per 100 inhabitants
Average length of stay for acute care hospitals (bed-days)
Practicing physicians per 100,000 inhabitants
Practicing nurses per 100,000 inhabitants
33
HHE 2018 | hospitalhealthcare.com
2000 2008 2015
8.4%
9.4%
9.0%
70.5%
68.4%
66.2%
38.8%
38.3%
42.0%
25.0%
25.8%
27.7%
371.0
339.0
340.0
366.0
333.0
326.0
10.7
11.3
10.7
7.8
6.8
7.2
n.a
n.a
n.a
n.a
n.a
n.a