Editorial

Citation

Gillies, P.A. and Harrop, M. (2010), "Editorial", Clinical Governance: An International Journal, Vol. 15 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/cgij.2010.24815aaa.001

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Clinical Governance: An International Journal, Volume 15, Issue 1

This is the first edition of Clinical Governance: An International Journal under the new editorship of Professor Alan Gillies and Mr Nick Harrop. We are seeking to build upon the established reputation of the journal, to make the journal even more relevant, interesting and authoritative. We would like to encourage a more international set of submissions and later in this volume we will feature a special issue from Canada.

We want to maintain the journal’s clinical audience and contributors but we also want the journal to attract the readership of managers and planners whose work both challenges and supports the clinicians whose work they facilitate. This is not to encourage managers to attack clinicians but to encourage parties on either side to reflect about and demonstrate ways the partnership might become more effective.

We will encourage authors to ground their contributions more in the wider literature, and to reflect upon their wider implications of their findings beyond their local context. We will also be seeking contributions which inform cross cutting themes such as risk management, change management, and better use of information and associated technologies, all in the name of improving patient care. We will be looking to use information technology better with a medium term goal of building a clinical governance community with the journal at its heart.

One of the challenges facing the editors of a journal about Clinical Governance is defining the term itself. Governance implies regulation and compliance. However, Clinical Governance also includes elements of improvement, and this is often the most difficult as well as the most important part.

Over ten years ago, Alan Gillies was involved with pre Clinical Governance audit activity in the Oxford region. An audit of published audits (presumably the better ones) showed that only a minority led to changes, demonstrated by re-audit to complete the audit cycle. Part of our mission is to establish a corpus of knowledge which informs and challenges the scope of clinical governance activity, and includes translation into real improvements in patient care.

A second challenge for the editors is the International part of the title. Clinical governance as a label was initiated in the UK. This journal originally had British in the title. We are unequivocally seeking to justify the International tag in our current title. Health care systems across the world face the same challenges as the UK. There is activity that the UK would recognise as clinical governance going on in every health care system, and if there isn’t, there should be. The global challenge is to provide the best possible outcomes within optimal use of available resources, with patients at the heart of healthcare.

As an academic journal, it is not our role to encourage endless scholastic definitions and re-definitions. Rather we wish to encourage balanced debates, reflecting alternative perspectives on what constitutes good practice, what facilitates good governance, and above all, what improves health care and patient health?

Professor Alan Gillies, Mick Harrop