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Glossary
Glossary
QualityTools™, sponsored by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services, provides a glossary of clarifying definitions and
examples of terms used to describe common properties of health care used in the standardized
abstracts (i.e., tool summaries).
- Education
- QualityTools defines "education" as any information that increases
awareness and positively influences the attitudes and knowledge of patients, practitioners,
and other health care professionals for the purpose of improving the health status of an
individual or a community.
- Institute of Medicine (IOM) Care Needs
- End of life care
- Care related to those not expected to survive more than six months.
- Getting better
- Care related to acute illness or injury.
- Living with illness
- Care related to chronic or recurrent illness.
- Staying healthy
- Care related to healthy populations or the general health needs of non-healthy populations
(e.g., health promotion, disease prevention, risk factor assessment, early detection by screening
and treatment of pre-symptomatic disease).
- Institute of Medicine (IOM) Domains
- Effectiveness
- Relates to providing care processes and achieving outcomes as supported by scientific evidence.
- Efficiency
- Relates to maximizing the quality of a comparable unit of health care delivered or unit of health benefit achieved for a given unit of health care resources used.
- Equity
- Relates to providing health care of equal quality to those who may differ in personal characteristics other than their clinical condition or preferences for care.
- Patient centeredness
- Relates to meeting patients' needs and preferences and providing education and support.
- Safety
- Relates to actual or potential bodily harm.
- Timeliness
- Relates to obtaining needed care while minimizing delays.
- Institute of Medicine (IOM) Priority Areas
- Asthma - appropriate treatment for persons with mild/moderate persistent asthma
- Cancer screening that is evidence-based - focus on colorectal and cervical cancer
- Care Coordination (cross cutting)
- Children with special health care needs
- Diabetes - focus on appropriate management of early disease
- End of life with advanced organ system failure - focus on congestive heart failure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
- Frailty associated with old age - preventing falls and pressure ulcers, maximizing function, and developing advanced care plans
- Hypertension - focus on appropriate management of early disease
- Immunization - children and adults
- Ischemic heart disease - prevention, reduction of recurring events, and optimization of functional capacity
- Major depression - screening and treatment
- Medication management - preventing medication errors and overuse of antibiotics
- Nosocomial infections - prevention and surveillance
- Obesity (emerging area)
- Pain control in advanced cancer
- Pregnancy and childbirth - appropriate prenatal and intrapartum care
- Self-management/health literacy (cross-cutting)
- Severe and persistent mental illness - focus on treatment in the public sector
- Stroke - early intervention and rehabilitation
- Tobacco dependence treatment in adults
- Tool
- QualityTools defines a "tool" as a web site, database, report, fact sheet, guide, or other
mechanism to assist health care professionals, policymakers, health plans, employers, patients, and
consumers in the development, promotion, or enhancement of health care quality within a practice,
organization, or in an individual's daily life.
- Tool Category
- Assessment of Therapeutic Effectiveness
- In QualityTools, this term categorizes tools that purposefully and clearly evaluate the
effectiveness of therapeutic modalities. This form of evaluation considers both the efficacy
of an intervention and its acceptance by those to whom it is offered. It answers the question:
Does the practice do more harm than good to people to whom it is offered?
- Counseling
- This term categorizes those tools in QualityTools where advice or guidance is provided to
patients by knowledgeable professionals.
- Diagnosis
- The National Library of Medicine defines this term as "The determination of the nature of a disease or condition or the distinguishing of one disease or condition from another. Assessment may be made through physical examination, laboratory tests, or the like, and may be assisted by computerized programs designed to enhance the decision-making process." Diagnoses can only be made by physicians.
- Evaluation
- This term can be used in two contexts:
- To describe follow-up (i.e., evaluating treatment). The National Library of Medicine defines this term as "Studies determining the effectiveness or value of processes, personnel, and equipment."
- To describe the initial assessment which may include gathering of information through interview, observation, examination and use of specific tests that allow patients to be evaluated for the possibility of a condition. Besides physician evaluations, the professional assessments performed by nurses and other health care professionals may be captured through the use of this term.
- Prevention
- For QualityTools, this term refers to the prevention of disease or mental disorders in susceptible individuals or populations through promotion of health, including mental health, and specific protection, as in immunization, as well as the prevention of complications or after-effects of existing disease. (i.e., complications of diabetes mellitus)
- Rehabilitation
- According to the National Library of Medicine rehabilitation is: "Restoration to the maximum degree possible of a person or persons suffering from disease or injury."
- Risk Assessment
- Risk assessment is defined as "The qualitative or quantitative estimation of the likelihood of adverse effects that may result from exposure to specified health hazards or from the absence of beneficial influences."
- Screening
- Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary defines this as interventions "performed for the early detection of disease or disease precursors in apparently well individuals so that health care can be provided early in the disease or before the disease becomes manifest." (i.e., screening for prostate cancer)
- Technology Assessment
- This term describes as assessment/evaluation/review on the use of a given technology for a given application(s) and comparison to other technologies used to diagnose or treat the same condition.
- Treatment
- Under the term "treatment", the safety, efficiency, efficacy, and effectiveness of a therapeutic intervention are considered.
- Vulnerable Populations
- Groups of persons who may be compromised in their ability to give informed consent, who are
frequently subjected to coercion in their decision making, or whose range of options is severely
limited, making them vulnerable to health care quality problems.
- Children
- All infants, children, and adolescents, i.e., all individuals who have not reached the legal age of consent.
- Disabled
- Persons with physical or mental disabilities that affect or limit their activities of daily living and that may require special accommodations. These include cognitively disabled, communicatively disabled, mentally disabled, and physically disabled.
- Frail Elderly
- Older adults or aged individuals who are lacking in general strength and are unusually susceptible to disease or to other infirmity.
- Homeless
- Persons who have no permanent residence, including children and adolescents with no fixed place of residence.
- Illiterate/low-literate populations
- Persons with low levels of education.
- Immigrants
- Persons coming into a country of which they are not a native for the purpose of setting up residence. This category is also defined to include refugees, asylees, and undocumented aliens or immigrants.
- Medically uninsured
- Individuals or groups with no or inadequate health insurance coverage. Those falling into this category usually comprise three primary groups: the medically indigent, those with clinical conditions that make them medically uninsurable, and the working uninsured.
- Mentally ill
- Persons diagnosed as having a syndrome of emotional, cognitive, and/or perceptual problems leading to significant impairment of functioning or behavior.
- Minority groups
- A subgroup having special characteristics within a larger group, often bound together by special ties which distinguish it from the larger group.
- Non-English speaking populations
- Individuals who do not speak English or whose primary language is not English.
- Poverty populations
- Persons living below the standard level of living of the community.
- Prisoners
- Individuals involuntarily confined in a penal institution, including persons sentenced under a criminal or civil statute, detained pending arraignment, trial or sentencing; and detained in other facilities under statutes or commitment procedures providing alternative to criminal prosecution or incarceration in a penal institution.
- Rural populations
- Persons inhabiting rural areas or small towns classified as rural.
- Terminally ill
- Persons with an incurable or irreversible illness at the end stage that will result in death within a short time.
- Transients/migrants
- Mobile, short-term residents who move, usually to find work.
- Urban populations
- Persons inhabiting a city or town, including metropolitan areas.
- Women
- Adult females, including working women (who are engaged in gainful activities usually outside the home), battered women (who are physically and mentally abused over an extended period), and pregnant women.
