BACKGROUND The primary aim of this study was to develop and validate a short psychometric instrument to assess the patient's perception of the quality of anaesthesia. METHODS In Part 1, the Perception of Quality in Anaesthesia (PQA) questionnaire was developed, pilot tested, and validated. Attributes of high-quality anaesthesia were identified using a process that restricted input to patients...

As required or implicated in many process improvement or assessment models, Process Quality Assurance (PQA) is introduced to objectively evaluate actual software processes against applicable processes descriptions, standards, and procedures and to identify potential noncompliance. In a Distributed Software Development (DSD) environment, PQA is also an absolute necessity to ensure that each deve...

BACKGROUND Rates of smoking cessation have not changed in a decade, accentuating the need for novel approaches to prompt quit attempts. METHODS Within a nationwide randomized clinical trial (N = 849) to induce further quit attempts and cessation, smokers currently unmotivated to quit were randomized to a practice quit attempt (PQA) alone or to nicotine replacement therapy (hereafter referred ...

The flicker and harmonics generated by electric arc furnaces present a problem that is well known to both the steel industry and electrical utilities. This paper presents a method to compensate for measurement errors introduced by current and voltage transformers and anti-aliasing filters in a power quality measurement system. Dynamic compensation may be performed in real time using digital fil...

OBJECTIVES To describe the five Phase I Pharmacy Quality Alliance (PQA) demonstration projects and discuss lessons learned across the projects. DESIGN Descriptive nonexperimental study. SETTING United States from July 2008 to November 2009. PARTICIPANTS Community pharmacies from five states. INTERVENTION Pharmacies viewed their performance scores on a reporting website and provided feed...

In this chapter, an innovative model for age replacement is proposed. The costs included in the age replacement model are not assumed to be constants. For effective optimization of statistical decisions for age replacement problems under parametric uncertainty, based on a past random sample of lifetimes, the pivotal quantity averaging (PQA) approach is suggested. The PQA approach represents a s...

The field of actuarial science uses mathematical and statistical techniques to evaluate financial risks in the insurance finance industries. Actuaries are creative, curious adaptable human resources problem solvers, who need possess different skills knowledge solve risk related problems. Partly Qualified (PQA) is semi-professionals actuary. From analyzing costs uncertainty pricing reserving, pa...

BACKGROUND Primary medication nonadherence (PMN) is any instance whereby patients fail to initiate a pharmacotherapy regimen after receiving a prescription for new therapy. The Pharmacy Quality Alliance (PQA) has proposed a standardized definition for PMN and a quality measure to assess the rates of PMN in community pharmacies. OBJECTIVES To (a) measure PMN using the proposed PQA measure with...