Background and purpose: Health services are challenged by increasingly complex medical processes and economic restraints in an aging population. Under these circumstances, medical quality management is developed and increasingly applied to survey especially complex and expensive clinical processes in the sense of controlling. In this process, practicability and relevance are fundamental.
Methods: This paper presents the well-established quality management system QiN (quality in nephrology) in the context of dialysis in end-stage renal disease.
Results: A quality-management system is well applicable in the case of dialysis. It can positively influence relevant indicators of process and outcome quality, as demonstrated here by the example of dialysis quantity.
Conclusions: Outcome and process quality in dialysis are quantifiable via defined indicators oriented on evidence-based medicine. The program based on benchmarking of basic clinical indicators leads to improved care of dialysis patients. A quality-management program of this type can represent an essential component of interdisciplinary, structured treatment programs, thereby influencing the whole treatment process.