Clinical governance: quality improvement and clinical audits in practice

Over recent years, the veterinary nursing profession has advanced. With changes to the clinical working environment, there is a renewed drive to provide the best quality care to patients, and an increase in the application of evidence-based medicine (EBM) and evidence-based veterinary medicine (EBVM). In this rapidly changing environment, it can be challenging to know if the care being provided is beneficial and whether it is in line with current EBM/EBVM. This is where, as veterinary nurses, we can put clinical governance to use to help us to plan, measure and improve current clinical practices (Health Quality and Safety Commissions (HQSC), 2017).

Clinical governance forms a comprehensive approach, which encompasses quality improvement (QI), EBVM and clinical audits, to help build reflective practice. It opens up the opportunity for productive discussion into how a practice can provide high-quality patient-driven care (HQSC, 2017). Clinical governance should allow for the transparent discussion of care between all members of the veterinary team; this process should help protect the patient by highlighting areas for improvement and allowing for the reporting of errors in a non-judgmental environment (Mosedale, 2019). By combining QI and EBM/EBVM, we should be able build precise and clear standards of care that are to be delivered to every patient, every time (HQSC, 2017).