Abstract
The privilege of professional self-regulation rests on clinical peer review, a long-established method for assuring quality of care, training, management and research. In clinical peer review, healthcare professionals evaluate each other's clinical performance. Based originally on the personal experience and expertise (and prejudices and biases) of one's peers, the process has gradually been formalised by the development of externally verifiable standards of practice, audit of care processes and outcomes and benchmarking of individual, group and organisational performance and patient outcomes. The spectrum of clinical peer review ranges from local quality improvement activities such as morbidity and mortality reviews, to medical opinion offered in courts of law. Peer review can therefore have different purposes ranging from collaborative reflective learning to identification of malpractice.
Original language | English |
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Journal | BMJ Quality & Safety |
DOIs | |
Publication status | E-pub ahead of print - 21 Jul 2022 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2022. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.
Keywords
- cluster trials
- critical care
- mortality (standardized mortality ratios)
- quality improvement methodologies
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Health Policy