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Our commitment to driving quality improvement and enhancing patient safety

At BMJ Best Practice, we are committed to empowering healthcare professionals with evidence-based knowledge to enhance patient care, streamline clinical decision-making and drive meaningful change.

Across the globe, healthcare teams have integrated BMJ Best Practice into their quality improvement initiatives, resulting in significant advances in diagnostics, treatment, and patient outcomes.

On this page, we highlight a series of innovative projects and posters that demonstrate the real-world impact of BMJ Best Practice. From improving care for patients with comorbidities to streamlining workflows and empowering multidisciplinary teams, these projects demonstrate the transformative potential of BMJ Best Practice in driving quality improvement initiatives globally.

What is BMJ Best Practice and how can it be used in quality improvement?

See how BMJ Best Practice is supporting quality improvement through:

  • Enhancing patient safety

  • Managing comorbidities

  • Reducing variation in care

  • Empowering the multidisciplinary team

  • Reducing costs

  • Innovating clinical decision support

The Implementation of a Rib Fracture Pathway at a Small District General Hospital to Improve Patient Care

This study aimed to improve the management of rib fractures at a district general hospital. By implementing a new management pathway that integrated BMJ Best Practice guidelines, the study enhanced the use of advanced analgesia and increased the involvement of the pain team, significantly improving the quality of care for patients with rib fractures.

Accuracy and Effects of Clinical Decision Support Systems Integrated With BMJ Best Practice–Aided Diagnosis: Interrupted Time Series Study

The CDSS integrated with BMJ Best Practice improved the accuracy of clinicians’ diagnoses. Shorter confirmed diagnosis times and hospitalisation days were also found to be associated with CDSS implementation in retrospective real-world studies.

A Pilot Study to Evaluate the Usefulness of an Innovative Digital Point-of-Care Information System for the Management of Multiple Chronic Conditions

This study showed that the BMJ Best Practice Comorbidities Manager was effective in helping healthcare professionals implement evidence-based care in the management of patients with multiple conditions.
Qoute

The purpose of BMJ Best Practice is to help healthcare professionals mobilise knowledge and drive clinical quality improvement in healthcare. Clinical quality improvement is vital if patients are to receive the care that they deserve. Improvement can involve all aspects of healthcare – including diagnosis, investigations, and management.

 Dr Kieran Walsh - Clinical Director, BMJ Group
Enhancing patient safety
Current abdominal X-rays practice in accident and emergency
This study evaluated the use of abdominal X-rays in a UK emergency department, identifying overuse and misalignment with guidelines. By incorporating BMJ Best Practice, the study informed recommendations to reduce unnecessary imaging and improve adherence to evidence-based guidelines, enhancing the quality of patient care.
Enhancing patient safety
Weight a minute – iatrogenic paracetamol toxicity is preventable by utilisation of well-designed drug charts
A quality improvement initiative to prevent avoidable drug errors in clinical practice. BMJ Best Practice was used to build the evidence base for the importance of the project.
Enhancing patient safety
Compliance with Glasgow Modified Alcohol Withdrawal Scale Guidelines within Emergency Medicine
This study used BMJ Best Practice to develop the evidence base of the standard they are trying to achieve and the intervention.
Managing comorbidities
Caring for patients with multiple conditions in Scandinavia and Northern Europe: the impact of the comorbidities manager from BMJ Best Practice
This evaluation of BMJ Best Practice showed its impact in improving the practice of healthcare professionals in Scandinavia and Northern Europe in delivering high-quality and safe care for patients with comorbidities.
Managing comorbidities
Clinical digital support tool in the management of comorbidities
This study demonstrates that BMJ Best Practice can help medical students and emerging junior doctors in the management of comorbidities.
Reducing variation in care
Audit of Antibiotic Prescriptions in Appendicectomies and Adherence of Surgeons to National and Local Trust Guidelines: Preoperative and Postoperative
BMJ Best Practice standards state that all patients should be given prophylactic antibiotics preoperatively, but only complicated cases (perforation and/or abscess and/or acutely unwell) need to be given postoperative antibiotics. The action plan included presenting results in the monthly surgical audit meeting, increasing awareness of the MicroGuide app and BMJ Best Practice standards and re-audit to enhance adherence to antimicrobial guidelines.
Reducing variation in care
Improving turnaround times for HLA-B*27 and HLA-B*57:01 gene testing: a Barts Health NHS Trust quality improvement project
Used BMJ Best Practice guidelines as a means of verifying the standard of care that they aimed to achieve.
Empowering the multidisciplinary team
Increased physiotherapy capacity reduces duration of tracheostomy in situ, reduces hospital length of stay and improves functional outcomes for people with an acquired brain injury (ABI): a service review
A mean improvement was found for patient outcomes; time with a tracheostomy in situ was reduced by 11 days and the length of hospital stay was reduced by 19 days. They used BMJ Best Practice to categorise the type of brain injury and its severity. (Cost of tracheostomy - about £4K per day)
Empowering the multidisciplinary team
A multidisciplinary, patient education and empowerment approach to improve fluid balance in patients on a cardiology ward
In this quality improvement project, a multidisciplinary team improved fluid balance for patients with heart failure on a cardiology ward. The team used BMJ Best Practice content and BMJ Patient Information Leaflets to drive quality improvement.
Reducing costs
Clinical decision support, cost savings, and improving care
This paper shows that frontline doctors use clinical decision support to improve care and save costs. Their primary motivation in using clinical decision support is to improve care—saving costs is seen as secondary. The doctors saw opportunities in saving costs primarily in reducing length of stay or avoiding admission to hospital.
Innovating clinical decision support
Infectious disease outbreaks: how online clinical decision support could help
This study of doctors who use BMJ Best Practice showed that “they primarily see utility in the tools as a result of their capacity to improve clinical practice in infectious diseases".
Innovating clinical decision support
Rapid translation of clinical guidelines into executable knowledge: A case study of COVID-19 and online demonstration
This modelling study demonstrated that it was feasible to create executable knowledge from BMJ Best Practice content on Covid-19.

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