Creating a Surgical Dashboard for Quality

Abstract

The surgical dashboard has been proposed as part of the solution to improve surgical quality. This condensed display of pertinent information, much like that in a car or airplane, offers the user insight into the workings of his or her machine at present and in the recent past.

Initially developed in the 1970s, their popularity has risen significantly in the last 50 years. These dashboards were designed to present graphical data that made it easy to recognize trends, whether positive or negative. This insight allowed for the identification of areas that needed improvement and also for the evaluation of previous interventions.

Surgical quality dashboards have become even more common over the past decade. With electronic health records having become an integral part of our healthcare system and the increased collection and distribution of health outcomes data, we have access to more data than ever before. Our increasing ability to collect and disseminate these data quickly allows for real-time feedback and focused adjustments in practice. However, with the available data having increased exponentially, it has become more difficult to parse through the troves of information to find those measures that are clinically relevant. Clinicians are often left wanting for a means to efficiently digest this information so that they can incorporate it into their practice. The most effective dashboards of today allow a surgeon to quickly identify trends in their personal practice as well as draw comparisons to colleagues, whether at the institutional or national level.