Research Guides: DNP: Doctor of Nursing Practice: QSEN

What is QSEN?

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) has funded the Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) project for three phases to date. The overall goal through all phases of QSEN is to address the challenge of preparing future nurses with the knowledge, skills, and attitudes (KSA) necessary to continuously improve the quality and safety of the healthcare systems in which they work.

In order to accomplish this goal, six competencies were defined in Phase I of the project. These competencies included five from the Institute of Medicine (IOM) - patient centered care, teamwork and collaboration, evidence-based practice, quality improvement and informatics - as well as safety. In addition to these definitions, sets of knowledge, skills, and attitudes for each of the six competencies were created for use in nursing pre-licensure programs (Cronenwett, et. al., 2007).

The QSEN Competencies

The six QSEN competencies are:

Patient-Centered Care
"Recognize the patient or designee as the source of control and full partner in providing compassionate and coordinated care based on respect for patient's preferences, values, and needs."
Teamwork & Collaboration
"Function effectively within nursing and inter-professional teams, fostering open communication, mutual respect, and shared decision-making to achieve quality patient care."
Evidence-Based Practice
"Integrate best current evidence with clinical expertise and patient/family preferences and values for delivery of optimal health care."
Quality Improvement
"Use data to monitor the outcomes of care processes and use improvement methods to design and test changes to continuously improve the quality and safety of health care systems."
Safety
"Minimizes risk of harm to patients and providers through both system effectiveness and individual performance."
Informatics
"Use information and technology to communicate, manage knowledge, mitigate error, and support decision making."