Evaluation of quality policies and strategies in health systems: a scoping review

Abstract

Objectives: Improving the quality of care requires specific, comprehensive and continuous attention from the administration of a health system. However, information on evaluations of national and subnational policies and strategies for quality is lacking. This study aims to map studies evaluating policies and strategies for quality in health systems around the world.

Design: This is a scoping review based on the guidelines of the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI), guided by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR).

Data sources: The search for articles was carried out in the Embase, Medline/Pubmed, Scopus, Web of Science and Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature databases and in the grey literature in July 2024.

Eligibility criteria: Publications describing a tool for evaluating interventions for quality in the health system and studies containing at least one conceptual framework related to the evaluation of policies and strategies for quality in the health system, in any language, were included.

Data extraction and synthesis: Data selection was carried out independently by two reviewers, whose conflicts were resolved by consensus and the decision of a third reviewer. The findings were synthesised using a data extraction protocol adapted from two theoretical frameworks on National Quality Policies and Strategies proposed by the WHO.

Results: The data search resulted in 133 potentially eligible studies, of which 14 studies were included in the review. We found 27 countries that had evaluated their policies or strategies, most of them in Asia (11) and Africa (9). Six studies used instruments to evaluate interventions for quality at the health system level. An instrument used in Afghanistan, Armenia, Guatemala and Mexico proved to be potentially useful for dissemination in other countries. Among the elements recommended by the WHO for the implementation of strategic policies for quality, the most present were governance and organisational structure.

Conclusions: Although the evidence provides an indication of how countries have implemented their quality policies and strategies, we identified the need for tools to assess their impact on health systems.

Keywords: Health Services; Health policy; Quality Improvement.

Figure 1. Flow diagram process of identification, selection and inclusion of studies—Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA).