A national clinical indicator database: Issues of reliability and validity

Abstract

The introduction of performance (clinical) indicators into the accreditation processby the Australian Council on Healthcare Standards is in keeping with global trendsand has enabled the establishment of a National Aggregate Database reflectingstandards of care in acute health care organisations. The database contains bothquantitative and qualitative information on the processes and outcomes of patientcare and changes in practice induced through indicator monitoring. Of fundamentalimportance to the integrity of the database are the issues of indicator validity,responsiveness and reliability. This paper considers these issues, drawing parallels, asappropriate, to other performance indicator programs and studies.