Foreign accreditation systems and quality management systems for hospitals

On the basis of a self developed catalogue of criteria, this paper examines the accreditation systems of the 'Australian Council on Healthcare Standards', the 'Canadian Council on Health Services Accreditation', the 'Hospital Accreditation Programme' (Great Britain) and the 'Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations' (USA). The results of this investigation are meant to serve as the basis for general recommendations with respect to the development of a national German accreditation system for hospitals. Apart from one system, all of the organisations dealt with in the paper have existed for more than 25 years.Results: All of the accreditation organisations are independent private institutions. Considerable differences exist among the systems concerning the type of financing, the recruitment and qualifications required of staff, the composition and the costs of the audit teams and the number of auditing-staff. The volume and structure of the manuals vary considerably from one another. Structure and outcome oriented standards are considered in varying degrees. However process oriented standards are included in all the manuals.General recommendations for the development of a German accreditation system for hospitals: 1) Independent, private organisations. 2) All auditors should be highly qualified professionals and possess a great deal of expierence in their jobs. 3) All standards should be process and outcome oriented and contain total quality components. 4) Six categories of accreditation values are recommended