ABSTRACT
Recent years have seen a surge of reform initiatives aimed at improving quality and patient safety in Israel. Within the last four years the Ministry of Health (MoH) has set down a policy infrastructure that includes a quality measures program, accreditation of hospitals, a nationally coordinated infection control program, a national patient experience survey, the establishment of a national program for electronic health information exchange, and other policy initiatives. With these steps, Israel seems to have closed the gap with other leading developed countries. In this chapter we will outline the challenges and opportunities for initiating successful quality and patient safety reform in Israel and attempt to discern which of the initiatives are already showing evidence of their success. Finally, we will recommend what future steps are needed to further advance quality and patient safety on a national level.
