Organizational Assessment Resources
Improving Communication—Improving Care
Illness, fear, low literacy, foreign languages and cultures, and many other factors can make it difficult for your staff to communicate with patients. “Improving communication – improving care” is a new organizational performance assessment toolkit from the Ethical Force Program® at the American Medical Association (AMA) designed to assist your organization in meeting the needs of a diverse patient population. This one-of-a-kind resource can help you assess how effectively your organization communicates, so you can target resources for improvement exactly where they're needed.
The toolkit can help organizations improve communication with all patient populations and many of the questions are specifically focused on common communication problems, such as culture, language and health literacy gaps.
Overview and contents of AMA Ethical Force Program toolkit
Licensing the Toolkit and Viewing its Surveys
This toolkit is far more than a set of surveys. We hope that you will find the toolkit—including the assessment instruments and protocols, analysis guide and data tools, and ideas for how to improve performance based on your specific results—to be a catalyst for productive organizational change.
The toolkit's surveys are available for viewing. You may download and use the surveys for research purposes at no cost and without a license. If you would like to use the surveys for organizational assessment, benchmarking and quality improvement, please contact the Ethical Force Program® for a list of qualified consultants who can assist you.
Ordering the Toolkit
The toolkit is available for use through qualified vendors, who have been trained in how to use the toolkit for quality improvement. For more information on using the toolkit in your organization call: (312) 464-4980 or e-mail Dr. Matthew Wynia, Executive Director of the Ethical Force Program.
Acknowledgments
Ethical Force Program staff would like to thank the program’s oversight body and expert advisory panel on Patient Centered Communication, both of which contributed to the development of the conceptual framework and consensus report on which this toolkit is based. View all acknowledgements.
Citation for Toolkit
The Ethical Force Program. The AMA Ethical Force Program toolkit: improving communication – improving care. Chicago IL: American Medical Association; 2008.
Ethical Force Program Consensus Report
The toolkit is based on the Ethical Force Program's consensus report "Improving comunication—improving care: How health care organizations can ensure effective, patient-centered communication with people from diverse populations"
Who should use the toolkit?
Short 10-item screening survey to see if the toolkit can help your organization.
View the Surveys
This toolkit is far more than a set of surveys – and a full assessment of an organization’s communication climate demands a skilled guide. To obtain optimal value from the toolkit, organizations should use these tools while working with a trained consultant. Please contact the Ethical Force Program by phone (312)-464-4980 or e-mail for a list of trained and qualified consultants who can help you use the toolkit to maximum benefit.
The toolkit's surveys are available for viewing. You may download and use the surveys for research purposes at no cost and without a license. If you would like to use the surveys for organizational assessment, benchmarking and quality improvement, please contact the Ethical Force Program® for a list of qualified consultants who can assist you.
Quality improvement resource guide
This resource guide was developed to accompany the Ethical Force Program's Organizational Assessment Toolkit.
