SynthesisQuality & safety in health care2007
Application of statistical process control in healthcare improvement: systematic review.
Synthesis in Quality & safety in health care, 2007. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 118 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
118 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Use of statistical process control in quality improvement projects in abdominal surgery: a PRISMA systematic review.BMJ open quality · 2024Pooled it
- Systems approach to health service design, delivery and improvement: a systematic review and meta-analysis.BMJ open · 2021Pooled it
- Bridging the Silos: A Comparative Analysis of Implementation Science and Improvement Science.Frontiers in health services · 2021Pooled it
- Can quality improvement improve the quality of care? A systematic review of reported effects and methodological rigor in plan-do-study-act projects.BMC health services research · 2019Pooled it
- Cluster randomised evaluation of a training intervention to increase the use of statistical process control charts for hospitals in England: making data count.BMJ quality & safety · 2025Trial
- Economic analysis of surgical outcome monitoring using control charts: the SHEWHART cluster randomised trial.BMJ quality & safety · 2024Trial
- Effect of monitoring surgical outcomes using control charts to reduce major adverse events in patients: cluster randomised trial.BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 2020Trial
- The impact of a prescription review and prescriber feedback system on prescribing practices in primary care clinics: a cluster randomised trial.BMC family practice · 2018Trial
- Improving Nursing Home Care through Feedback On PerfoRMance Data (INFORM): Protocol for a cluster-randomized trial.Trials · 2017Trial
- Learning Health System Implementation: Building a Hub-and-Spoke Model for Hypertension Management Through the QI Hub.Journal of general internal medicine · 2026Article
- Article
- Surveillance of Pharmaceutical Risk-Mitigation Behavior: Applying and Comparing Statistical Process Control Methods Using Real World Data.Learning health systems · 2026Article
- Interpretable Framework for Sleep Monitoring: Applying Statistical Control Charts to Physiological Data Streams.Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Reduced wait times for hepatology referrals in a prospective quality improvement initiative.Hepatology communications · 2026Article
- Near Miss Reporting and Organizational Learning in Health Care: Conceptual Framework Development Study.JMIR human factors · 2026Article
- Optimising the emergency-readiness of public access defibrillators across Wales using quality improvement methodology.BMJ open quality · 2026Article
- Re-establishing control limits in statistical process control analyses: the stable shift algorithm.BMJ quality & safety · 2026Article
- The Norwegian Adult Mental Health Registry for Quality Control in Specialized Mental Health Services: Protocol for a Nationwide Naturalistic Study.JMIR research protocols · 2026Article
- Improvement science as the engine for the next generation of learning health networks.Frontiers in health services · 2026Article
- Statistical process control within the Six Sigma DMAIC framework for monitoring medication dispensing errors in hospital pharmacies: a Saudi case study.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2026Article
58 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveTo systematically review the literature regarding how statistical process control--with control charts as a core tool--has been applied to healthcare quality improvement, and to examine the benefits, limitations, barriers and facilitating factors related to such application. DATA SOURCES: Original articles found in relevant databases, including Web of Science and Medline, covering the period 1966 to June 2004. STUDY SELECTION: From 311 articles, 57 empirical studies, published between 1990 and 2004, met the inclusion criteria.
methodsA standardised data abstraction form was used for extracting data relevant to the review questions, and the data were analysed thematically.
resultsStatistical process control was applied in a wide range of settings and specialties, at diverse levels of organisation and directly by patients, using 97 different variables. The review revealed 12 categories of benefits, 6 categories of limitations, 10 categories of barriers, and 23 factors that facilitate its application and all are fully referenced in this report. Statistical process control helped different actors manage change and improve healthcare processes. It also enabled patients with, for example asthma or diabetes mellitus, to manage their own health, and thus has therapeutic qualities. Its power hinges on correct and smart application, which is not necessarily a trivial task. This review catalogs 11 approaches to such smart application, including risk adjustment and data stratification.
conclusionStatistical process control is a versatile tool which can help diverse stakeholders to manage change in healthcare and improve patients' health.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.