Navigating the Perinatal Quality Landscape

The National Quality Strategy, mandated by the Affordable Care Act, outlines the triple aim of better health, better care, and lower costs. Perinatal nurses are integral to the National Quality movement as care providers, leaders, and experts. The most notable accomplishments in perinatal care of the last decade relate to the endorsement of quality measures by the National Quality Forum that provide unified goals and the quality improvement frameworks provided by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement that help systems create action and change through education, team building, process improvement, and structure. Fourteen perinatal quality measures are currently endorsed by the National Quality Forum, 5 of which are mandated by The Joint Commission and required for accreditation. Understanding the current perinatal quality measures and the resources available for implementation is essential to nursing care delivery. Realizing the nurses' role within the quality improvement landscape and mobilizing nationally endorsed quality measures as levers for nurse-led improvement projects promise actualization of marked quality improvement in perinatal care.