Listserv use enhances quality and safety in multisite quality improvement efforts.

A listserv is an e-mail group to which people subscribe based upon common interests. We used a retrospective study to examine the relationship between listserv use and team success for health care quality improvement efforts. We hypothesized high listserv use would be associated with team success.

A multihospital safety improvement effort and the dissemination of new knowledge.

Background: Research on the transfer of medical technology and guidelines suggests that this transfer is driven more by interpersonal relationships than by new research or available information and that it is inconsistent, largely unsuccessful, and strongly influenced by local factors. Yet studies of collaborative, multiple-hospital improvement efforts have shown these transfers to be effective for the specific microsystems participating in the project. The diffusion of medical innovations beyond the participating teams was studied during a 2000-2001 national collaborative safety improvement effort.