The Quality Assurance Project /QAP) provided technical assistance to the Chilean Ministry of Health from March 1991 until December 1994. During that time, QAP staff and consultants worked with local health professionals to develop a national quality assurance (QA) program and local QA " expertise. The expressed goals of the program were to 1) raise awareness about the importance of quality throughout the health system; 2) develop am a structure for the support of quality assurance activities; 3) achieve measurable improvements in quality of care and service delivery; and 4) improve patient satisfaction. To a large extent, the quality assurance effort m in Chile was able to achieve these goals. The National Program for the Evaluation and Improvement of Quality (known by its Spanish acronym, am EMC) within the Ministry of Health is now well developed, with QA programs operating in nearly all of Chile's 29 decentralized Health Services. EMC does not depend on external financing or technical assistance. This report summarizes the activities of the first four years of the process of institutionalizing quality assurance in the Chilean public health system, during which time the Quality Assurance Project collaborated with the EMC. (excerpt)