Clinical quality assurance in radiology and pathology reporting

Medica has developed a secure and unique system in-house for assessing discrepancies. Our system focuses on a set of criteria: observation, interpretation, communication and risk of harm to patients. The data output from the review informs quality improvement.

Medica’s clinical leadership team has many years of experience in identifying and understanding patterns of discrepancy. The data is taken in conjunction with a full case review context. This leads to quality improvement through communication with reporters in a reflective, developmental environment.

Feedback to reporters is a key step in our quality assurance process, delivered by the clinical leadership team. Each reporter is also provided with a tailored monthly feedback report that enables rapid review of audit results on both a monthly and annual trend basis.

Medica uses the same principles developed from our in-house system for reporters to assist external providers in evaluating their reporters. This is an ‘External Client Audit System’ Medica has developed as a second unique management system to support the process.

Medica’s patient safety incident response policy is an overarching policy for patient safety management in the organisation. The document aligns with NHS PSIRF principles and is underpinned by Systems Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety principles (SEIPS). It includes detail for relevant aspects of incident management in our organisation, including patient safety incident reporting and safety improvement monitoring. The document can be found here.