Resources: Organizations

The following collection of resources represents a partial list of organizations and programs that relate to the advancement and development of improvement science:

The Cochrane Collaboration:

“The Cochrane Collaboration is an international not-for-profit and independent organization, dedicated to making up-to-date, accurate information about the effects of healthcare readily available worldwide. It produces and disseminates systematic reviews of healthcare interventions and promotes the search for evidence in the form of clinical trials and other studies of interventions.”

The Academic Center for Evidence-Based Practice:

“The purpose of the Academic Center for Evidence-Based Practice (ACE) is to advance cutting-edge, state-of-the-art evidence-based practice, research, and education within an interprofessional context. The goal is to turn research into action, improving health care and outcomes through evidence-based practice (EBP), research, and education.”

Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) 5 Million Lives Campaign:

“The 5 Million Lives Campaign was a voluntary initiative to protect patients from five million incidents of medical harm between December 2006 and December 2008.”

Clinical and Translational Science Awards:

“The Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSAs) program creates a definable academic home for clinical and translational research. CTSA institutions work to transform the local, regional, and national environment to increase the efficiency and speed of clinical and translational research across the country.”

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Patient Safety Culture Surveys:

“As part of its goal to support a culture of patient safety and quality improvement in the Nation's health care system, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) sponsored the development of patient safety culture assessment tools for hospitals, nursing homes, and ambulatory outpatient medical offices.”

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Interdisciplinary Nursing Quality Research Initiative:

“The primary goal of the Interdisciplinary Nursing Quality Research Initiative (INQRI) is to generate, disseminate and translate research to understand how nurses contribute to and can improve the quality of patient care.”

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Health Care Innovations Exchange:

“The U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality's Health Care Innovations Exchange is a comprehensive program designed to accelerate the development and adoption of innovations in health care delivery. This program supports the Agency's mission to improve the safety, effectiveness, patient-centeredness, timeliness, efficiency, and equity of care—with a particular emphasis on reducing disparities in health care and health among racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic groups.”

The National Guidelines Clearinghouse:

“The National Guideline Clearinghouse™ (NGC) is a comprehensive database of evidence-based clinical practice guidelines and related documents. The NGC mission is to provide physicians, nurses, and other health professionals, health care providers, health plans, integrated delivery systems, purchasers and others an accessible mechanism for obtaining objective, detailed information on clinical practice guidelines and to further their dissemination, implementation and use.”