BACKGROUND Current evidence suggests that women need effective support to breastfeed, but many healthcare staff lack the necessary knowledge, attitudes and skills. There is therefore a need for breastfeeding education and training for healthcare staff. The primary aim of this review is to determine whether education and training programs for healthcare staff have an effect on their knowledge an...

The quality of the "patient-carer" relationship is the foundation of self-management support and has been shown to influence treatment outcome in relation to psychological and somatic illness, including diabetes. It has long been accepted within applied psychology that the quality of the client-therapist relationship--termed the working alliance--is of central importance to treatment outcome an...

Background The positive effects of the Dutch Community Occupational Therapy in Dementia programme on patients' daily functioning were not found in a multicentre randomised controlled trial (RCT) in Germany. Objectives To evaluate possible effect modification on the primary outcome within the German RCT with regard to (1) participant characteristics, (2) treatment performance and (3) healthcare...

This study assessed e-healthcare readiness of rural and urban hospitals in North West Province of South Africa. Outcome of assessment led to creation of e-health architectural framework for e-health solutions. Assessment was conducted in usage of ICT in patient healthcare record system, processes and procedures in consultation among healthcare professionals, prescription of medication, referral...

Background and Aim: Evaluation of the treatment outcome is an important stage in every healthcare system, including orthodontics. This study aimed to assess the atti-tude and practice regarding treatment outcome assessment (TOA) among Iranian orthodontists. Materials and Methods: In this cross-sectional survey, a questionnaire was developed, which consisted of demographic, attitude, and practi...

OBJECTIVES To seek public opinion on the reporting of medical errors and the anonymity of healthcare workers who report medical errors. DESIGN AND PARTICIPANTS A random, representative survey of 2005 South Australians in April 2002, using telephone interviews based on a vignette provided. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES When a medical error occurs (i) whether the incident should be reported, and (ii)...

Healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) constitute a major safety problem. Healthcare managers need complete and valid information to fight against these infections. The purpose of this study was to develop a dashboard of indicators to help healthcare managers monitor HAIs. A pilot testing approach was used that was composed of the following steps: literature review, consultation with infection...

OBJECTIVE To examine the relationship between public perceptions of key performance indicators assessing various aspects of the health-care system. DESIGN Cross-sequential survey research. Annual telephone surveys of random samples of adult Albertans selected by random digit dialing and stratified according to age, sex and region (n = 4000 for each survey year). The survey questionnaires incl...

BACKGROUND Trials using inadequate levels of blinding may report larger effect sizes than blinded studies. It has been suggested that blinded outcome assessment in open trials may in some cases be undertaken by assessments of photographs. The aim of this paper is to explore the effect of using different methods to assess the primary outcome in the EVerT (Effective Verruca Treatments) trial. It ...

Structure measures are typically most valuable when good quality of care is unlikely, as it will often help illustrate glaring deficiencies. Process measures attempt to assess healthcare provider’s compliance with practices that are associated with positive outcomes. Outcome quality measures assess whether healthcare goals were realized. These measures can range from mortality, cost of care and...