A continuous, systematic process for evaluating the products, services and work processes of organizations that are recognized as representing best practices for the purpose of organizational improvement (1992). In other words, “Taking the best of the best to make it better.”
A system whereby health care assessment undertakes to measure its performance against “best practice” standards. Best practice standards can reflect: (1) Evidence-based medical practice. This is practice supported by current investigative studies of like patient populations. (2) Knowledge-based systems. Explicit in benchmarking is movement away from anecdotal and single-practitioner experience based practice: “I had a patient once who …”