Quality and safety are cornerstones of healthcare and essential good nursing practice. In my five years of being a registered nurse, I have always prided myself on providing excellent, safe care. With the attitude that I will always “treat my patients as if they were my family,” my perspective on the quality of my patient care is it will always be exemplary. Often times, a good nurse is what stands between a patient and an excellent outcome, whatever that may entail. By providing quality care, a safe outcome is always essential. Once you give a medication, you cannot take it back. To check, recheck, and provide my patients with the most safe care, I am the last line of defense between my patients and a negative outcome.

My Professional Roles and Values class cemented my commitment to quality and also expanded my definition to include the consideration of my new role as a school nurse, on the front lines of public health. Quality then encompasses how one can affect the greatest beneficial change to the population you serve. In Leadership and Professional Image, task 1,  creating a plan to begin an online and social media campaign to increase access to school health services, I broadened my definition of what quality and safety truly mean.

During my coursework at WGU, the Organizational Systems and Quality Leadership class helped me cement my belief in quality and safety. It taught me that as practitioners, we must always strive for quality. Becoming a leader of quality care, the IHI health modules taught me that I must utilize science, best practices, and patient centered care as the mechanism through which I ensure I deliver my best care.

My certificate from my IHI coursework will show my current and prospective employers that I am truly dedicated to what is titled as their “Triple Aim.” IHI’s Triple Aim is “a framework that creates a mechanism of creating excellence in improving patient experience, improving population health, and finally reducing the capitol cost of healthcare” (IHI, 2018). Completion of this coursework shows competence in these principles. I will continue to utilize this framework in my nursing practice going forward. The IHI certificate and my definition of quality and safety go hand in hand. I have always believed the safety is the pinnacle of excellence in nursing. The artifacts and my definition only prove to support one another. As I further my career, these tools will serve me well as I have always believed in the importance of quality and safety.

Institute for Healthcare Improvement. (2018). Retrieved from,  

      http://www.ihi.org/Engage/Initiatives/TripleAim/Pages/default.aspx.

      March 30, 2018.