Tracer Methodology and the quality of care: integrative literature review.

Objective: To analyze the scientific literature about the Tracer Method in the area of nursing.

Method: Integrative literature review with 22 articles from the following databases: Latin American and Caribbean Literature in Health Sciences (LILACS); Medical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System Online(Medline/PubMed); Scientific Electronic Library Online (SciELO); Cumulative Index to Nursing & Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) and Web of Science. The search strategy included descriptors and keywords, as follows: Método Tracer, Método Traçador, Método Rastreador, Método de Avaliação, Usuário Guia amd Enfermagem correlated and combined with Boolean operators.

Results: Data was organized according to the scenarios where the method was applied, namely: health condition as a tracer condition for assessing the quality of care, compliance and non-compliance regarding the institutional protocols, reflection and training for accreditation.

Conclusion: The Tracer Methodology is used for evaluating and improving the quality of care.