PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Sheila Leatherman
AU  - Tim Gardner
AU  - Aoife Molloy
AU  - Sara Martin
AU  - Jennifer Dixon
TI  - Strategy to improve the quality of care in England
AID  - 10.7861/futurehosp.3-3-182
DP  - 2016 Oct 01
TA  - Future Hospital Journal
PG  - 182--187
VI  - 3
IP  - 3
4099  - http://www.rcpjournals.org/content/3/3/182.short
4100  - http://www.rcpjournals.org/content/3/3/182.full
SO  - Future Hosp J2016 Oct 01; 3
AB  - The Five Year Forward View describes ‘closing the care and quality gap’ as one of three strategic challenges facing the English NHS by 2020. The need for a coherent national strategy for achieving high-quality, affordable care has rarely been more pressing, but how effectively do existing national decisions and interventions support clinicians delivering care on the front line? And, in a complex and dynamic environment with multiple players, how should the health service move forward to develop a balanced strategy for quality that accommodates longer term goals as well as more immediate political priorities? Research by a team at the Health Foundation has assessed how the array of organisations, initiatives and approaches to quality stack up as an emergent strategy. Four concepts were used to provide a yardstick for quality-related policies and activities to help identify potential imbalances, gaps and duplication. The findings of this work, together with suggested steps to rectify the issues identified, are described here.