Managing patient care with clinical pathways: A practical application

Clinical pathway development has been an ongoing process at most hospitals for the past decade. Early articles described the development process and t he implementation problems encountered. Articles that are more recent have described standard implementation procedures. Discussions of staff educatio nal requirements, organizational structure and responsibilities, the action plan, and the evaluation process are less common. This article describes a complete practical application of clinical pathway development, implementa tion, and evaluation, with emphasis on organizational and research issues n ot, typically addressed in the literature.