Joint Commission Reference Site

Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations

The Joint Commission evaluates and accredits nearly 17,000 healthcare organizations and programs in the United States. An independent, not-for-profit organization, JCAHO is the nation's predominant standards-setting and accrediting body in healthcare. Since 1951, JCAHO has developed state-of-the-art, professionally based standards and evaluated the compliance of healthcare organizations against these benchmarks.

Leapfrog Group

Composed of more than 135 public and private organizations that provide healthcare benefits, The Leapfrog Group works with medical experts throughout the U.S. to identify problems and propose solutions that it believes will improve hospital systems that could break down and harm patients. Representing approximately 33 million healthcare consumers in all 50 states, Leapfrog provides important information and solutions for consumers and healthcare providers.

The Institute For Safe Medication Practices (ISMP)

The Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) is a nonprofit organization that works closely with healthcare practitioners and institutions, regulatory agencies, professional organizations and the pharmaceutical industry to provide education about adverse drug events and their prevention.

National Patient Safety Foundation

The mission of the National Patient Safety Foundation is to measurably improve patient safety in the delivery of healthcare.

National Quality Forum

The National Quality Forum is a not-for-profit membership organization created to develop and implement a national strategy for healthcare quality measurement and reporting.

The IOM Quality of Healthcare in America Committee was formed in June 1998 to develop a strategy that will result in a threshold improvement in quality over the next ten years. This report addresses issues related to patient safety, a subset of overall quality-related concerns, and lays out a national agenda for reducing errors in healthcare and improving patient safety. Although it is a national agenda, many activities are aimed at prompting responses at the state and local levels and within healthcare organizations and professional groups.