Quality is, according to the Institute of Medicine (IOM), the degree to which health services for individuals and populations increase the likelihood of desired health outcomes and are consistent with current professional knowledge. Quality can be defined as a measure of the degree to which delivered health services meet established professional standards and judgments of value to consumers. Quality may also be seen as the degree to which actions taken or not taken maximize the probability of beneficial health outcomes and minimize risk and other untoward outcomes, given the existing state of medical science and art. Quality is frequently described as having three dimensions: quality of input resources; quality of the process of services delivery (the use of appropriate procedures for a given condition); and quality of outcome of service use (actual improvement in condition or reduction of harmful effects). Quality is how well the health plan or health care provider keeps its members or patients healthy or treats them when they are sick. Good quality health care means doing the right thing at the right time, in the right way, for the right person - and getting the best possible results. Quality programs are commonly called QA, TQM, QI, CQI - all referring to the process of monitoring quality in systematic ways.