Quality Improvement Abstracts

Title and Author Information
Description (Introduction) and Aim: Why did you start? background, intended improvement, the study question
Actions Taken (Methods): What did you do?
Results: What did you find?
Summary of Results (Discussion): What do the findings mean?

PAFP Scoring Rubric QI Poster

Introduction/Description and Aim
Background: Brief, non-selective summary of current knowledge of the care problem being addressed. Intended Improvement: Describes the specific aim of the proposed intervention, specifies who and what triggered the decision to make changes, and why now.

The Aim: The primary improvement-related question and any secondary questions that the study of the intervention was designed to answer.

Actions Taken/Methods
Setting: Identify elements of the local care environment most likely to influence change/improvement.

Planning the intervention: Describe the intervention, factors that contributed to choice of the specific intervention, and plans to implement the intervention.

Planning the study of the intervention: How you’ll assess how well the intervention was implemented, how you’ll test whether those mechanisms were effective, what study design you’ll use to measure impact, and describe internal and external validity.

Methods of evaluation: Describes instruments and procedures used, efforts to validate and test reliability of instruments, and explains methods to assure data quality and adequacy

Analysis: Provides details of qualitative and quantitative methods used to draw inferences.

Results/What did you find?
Nature of setting and intervention:
Characterizes relevant elements, explains the actual course of the intervention, documents degree of success in implementation, describes the evolution of the plan, and lessons learned.

Changes in processes of care and patient outcomes:
Presents data on changes observed in the care delivery process and in measures of patient outcomes. Presents evidence regarding the strength of association between observed changes and intervention components.

Summary of Results/What the findings mean:
Summarize the most important successes and challenges in implementing the intervention components.
Relation to other evidence: Compare and contrast study results with relevant findings of others.
Limitations that might have affected study outcomes or impacted the generalizability and/or efforts to maintain improvement.
Interpretation: Explore differences between observed and expected outcomes. Suggest steps that might be modified to improve future performance. Review costs.
Conclusions: Considers overall practical usefulness of the intervention.