Relationship Between Accreditation and Quality Indicators in Hospital Care: A Review of the Literature

There is a widespread and increasing tendency to develop hospital performance indicators in the field of accreditation/certification system and quality benchmarking. The aim of this study was to identify the relationship between accreditation and quality indicators used in hospital care services. A systematic review of literature was carried out. The search used the data base of MEDLINE in the duration from January 2005 to January 2011. Hospital-based full article English language studies which examined the relationship of quality indicators and accreditation were included. Discussion or commentary pieces were excluded. Results revealed that Out of the 222 initially allocated studies, 23 studies that matched the search inclusion criteria were selected. In many of the included studies using of quality indicators resulted in improvement of the hospital health services. In conclusion, it is essential for quality improvement of health care organizations to have quality indicators and go through accreditation.