The Good Samaritan Society completed a very successful Accreditation.
Accreditation Canada is a not-for-profit, independent organization that provides health organizations with an external peer review to assess the quality of their services based on standards of excellence. The Accreditation process is an ongoing quality improvement process whereby the work continues over time.
All of GSS was surveyed with the exception of:
- PPDD: who have their own accreditation process through another organization
- CHOICE programs: who are accredited through Alberta Health Services
- Seniors’ Clinic and the other day programs: currently have not been assessed against accreditation standards
Five Accreditation Teams were created in the following areas:
- Effective and Sustainable Governance
- Effective Organization
- Long Term Care
- Infection Prevention and Control
- Medication Management
The Accreditation Canada team of four spent four days reviewing these areas at various sites throughout the organization and at the end of their review, they informed us that The Good Samaritan Society met 421 of a possible 433 standards and had only 5 unmet standards. The 5 unmet standards, including one Required Organizational Practice (ROP) are currently in the process of being addressed.
The outstanding ROP was in relation to not fully completed work for the Do Not Use Abbreviations for documentation in our clinical records and practice.
For comparison purposes, we met 99% of the standards this time as opposed to 94% of the standards during the last Accreditation survey in 2008.
The surveyors were very complimentary of the organization as a whole and in particular of the way in which we live our values each and every day. They also said that we had best practices that they were planning to take back to their own organizations.