Accreditation

[This is preliminary documentation and is subject to change.]

TOPICA contains a sub-system for accreditation.

The term "sub-system" signals, that is not a standard part of a TOPICA application.

A default installation of a new database (see Creating a new Database) does NOT build the data model for the accreditation sub-system. In order to build the necessary data model, special action must be taken - this is NOT documented (yet?).

The code implementing the functionality in the accreditation sub-system IS built into the framework, however. I.e. no special action must be taken in order to activate the functionality. The code in the framework tests for the existence of the necessary data model. If the data model for accreditation exists in the database, the corresponding functionality is enabled in the user interface.

The accreditation sub-system requires the Blog and Document references sub-systems. I.e. these sub-systems must be installed in order for the accreditation sub-system to work.

Use cases involved in accreditation

Administering Standards and Indicators	The set of standards and indicators are built centrally. Standards may be given references using the Document references sub-system. Users may communicate about a particular standard or indicator using the Blog sub-system.
Organization Administration	Standard TOPICA functionality - with a few extra twists: Defining the institution level. Activating institutions and their sub-units for distribution and/or accreditation. Optinally setting up functions to facilitate automated distribution. Users may communicate using the Blog sub-system.
User Administration	Standard TOPICA functionality. Note, however, that when the accreditation sub-system is installed, the list of permissions is extended with several permissions, that are meaningful in the accreditation sub-system only. These permissions should be organized in profiles - see Permissions and Profiles.
Documentation	The Document references sub-system is used for this. Create document references on organizational units on any level. Each document reference may be related to standards and/or indicators.
Distribution	Distribution of standards and indicators to institutions and sub-units.
Record Audit	Select (a subset of) the indicators requiring record audit. Selecting a small sample (e.g. 20) patient records, and register whether each record complies with each of the indicators.
Selfevaluation	Staff on each sub-unit evaluate the processes on their own sub-unit.
Survey	A team of external surveyors visit the institution's sub-units, record findings, and assess compliance to standards. This ends up with that an accreditation board gives the institution an accreditation status. I.e. accreditation is the result of a successful survey.