| EPOC subcategory |
Definition |
| Audit and feedback |
A summary of health workers’ performance over a specified period of time, given to them in a written, electronic or verbal format. The summary may include recommendations for clinical action. |
| Clinical practice guidelines |
Clinical guidelines are systematically developed statements to assist healthcare providers and patients to decide on appropriate health care for specific clinical circumstances'(US IOM). |
| Educational materials |
Distribution to individuals, or groups, of educational materials to support clinical care, i.e. any intervention in which knowledge is distributed. For example this may be facilitated by the Internet, learning critical appraisal skills; skills for electronic retrieval of information, diagnostic formulation; question formulation. |
| Educational meetings |
Courses, workshops, conferences or other educational meetings. |
| Educational outreach visits, or academic detailing |
Personal visits by a trained person to health workers in their own settings, to provide information with the aim of changing practice. |
| External funding |
Financial contributions such as donations, loans, etc. from public or private entities from outside the national or local health financing system. |
| Inter‐professional education |
Continuing education for health professionals that involves > 1 profession in joint, interactive learning. |
| Length of consultation |
Changes in the length of consultations. |
| Local consensus processes |
Formal or informal local consensus processes, for example agreeing a clinical protocol to manage a patient group, adapting a guideline for a local health system or promoting the implementation of guidelines. |
| Local opinion leaders |
The identification and use of identifiable local opinion leaders to promote good clinical practice. |
| Managerial supervision |
Routine supervision visits by health staff. |
| Monitoring the performance of the delivery of healthcare |
Monitoring of health services by individuals or healthcare organisations, for example by comparing with an external standard. |
| Other |
Strategies were classified as other if they did not clearly fit within the standard subcategories. |
| Pay for performance – target payments |
Transfer of money or material goods to healthcare providers conditional on taking a measurable action or achieving a predetermined performance target, for example incentives for lay health workers. |
| Procurement and distribution of supplies |
Systems for procuring and distributing drugs or other supplies. |
| Tailored interventions |
Interventions to change practice that are selected based on an assessment of barriers to change, for example through interviews or surveys. |
| The use of information and communication technology |
Technology based methods to transfer healthcare information and support the delivery of care. |
