Outpatient care has become a preferred option for many patients across the U.S. These patients prioritize convenience, cost, and comfort, but they are not willing to compromise trust and quality of care. More than anything, they demand reassurance that their health is in the hands of qualified, trained, and competent providers.
As the Ambulatory Surgical Center landscape becomes increasingly competitive, proving the quality of your staff is the key to gaining patient trust. Accreditation is a powerful differentiator that proves your ASC staff have gone above and beyond to meet high standards of care and safety.
Overcoming Patient Misconceptions: The First Pivotal Step
In a 2021 study, patients of every age agreed that their two top motivating factors when choosing where to receive care were1:
- The facility will provide them with quality care through proven and capable doctors, nurses, technicians, and administrative staff, and
- The facility employs only the highest quality, board-certified physicians.
Patients see an inseparable connection between the qualifications of staff and the quality of care.
ASCs face an uphill battle in this regard due to unfounded but widespread concerns around staff standards.
22% of surveyed patients in the same study expressed concerns about the qualifications and certifications of physicians practicing at outpatient care facilities like ambulatory surgical centers.1 24% worried about physicians’ lack of hospital affiliation, underscoring clear trust issues with outpatient facility staffing.1
Accreditation is an opportunity for ASCs to set the record straight about the quality of their staff and earn the patient trust they rightly deserve.
Accreditation Verifies Staff Qualifications and Excellence
As part of QUAD A’s thorough accreditation process, accredited ASCs have committed to extensive personnel standards. In short, these standards verify that a facility and its staff are aligned with providing the highest quality of care for patients.
As part of the accreditation survey process, QUAD A verifies the credentials of critical ASC personnel, including the Medical Director, Facility Director, surgeons, proceduralists, and other physicians, as well as anesthesia providers. This provides an assurance that these staff members are in good standing with the appropriate governing bodies in accordance with approved policies and procedures.
In addition to validating staff credentials, QUAD A also verifies that your facility’s staffing protocols provide the highest level of patient safety and oversight. QUAD A-accredited facilities offer consistent patient observation and supervision in the operating suite, nursing, and post-anesthesia care units, and that the appropriate personnel are immediately available in case of emergency.
Accreditation Is a Commitment to Ongoing Staff Training
Proving your staff’s current qualifications is a great method for building patient trust, but accreditation takes that opportunity to new heights. Accreditation represents a continuous commitment to staffing excellence.
As healthcare standards evolve throughout the years so do QUAD A‘s standards for staff training and credentialing. To maintain accreditation, ASCs must routinely demonstrate that their staff are dedicated to continuous improvement and to ever-improving quality care benchmarks. QUAD A verifies that dedication in a number of ways.
The first is through ongoing surveys beyond achieving accreditation. QUAD A-accredited ASCs must submit a self-survey every year and undergo a resurvey by QUAD A’s surveyors every three years.
As part of these surveys, the ASC must prove that their staff have kept their certifications up to date, and that they have evidence of various annual trainings that are related to patient safety, including:
- Annual hazard safety training
- Annual bloodborne pathogen training
- Annual universal precaution training
- Other annual safety trainings such as operative fire safety training and structure fire safety, including the operation of a fire extinguisher
- Basic Cardiopulmonary Life Support (BLS) certification for each operating room and PACU team member, depending on the patient population served
- The knowledge to provide treatment for cardiopulmonary and anaphylactic emergencies
- Familiarity with the equipment and procedures utilized in treating emergencies
ASCs also prove their staff’s commitment to ongoing excellence through QUAD A’s proprietary Patient Safety Data Reporting (PSDR) system. Every three months, QUAD A-accredited ASCs volunteer data from three random cases and all unanticipated sequelae for each surgeon and proceduralist. PSDR creates a culture of clinical quality in which all ASC physicians are actively involved in datasets used in research to provide important safeguards for patient safety.
Prove Your Staff’s Excellence with ASC Accreditation by QUAD A
As outpatient care becomes the new standard for patients across the nation, ASCs that prove their high standards for staff can stand out from the crowd and earn patient trust. A well-qualified team signals your facility’s commitment to high-level care and safety.
QUAD A’s ASC Accreditation program is a proven path for Ambulatory Surgical Centers to verify the credentials of their staff, commit to continuous training and improvement, and strengthen their reputation. Explore the program, and start the path to accreditation today.
Source
- Verve. (2021) Patient Journey Final Report. Unpublished internal QUAD A report; 2021.
