The international Magnet® journey

Three Australian hospitals have successfully met the rigorous criteria and challenging processes of the Magnet Recognition Program.^® There are only three other international Magnet^® facilities: Singapore General Hospital, the American University of Beirut (Lebanon) Medical Centre, and the King Faisal Specialist Hospital & Research Centre — Jeddah in Saudi Arabia. It seems timely to explore the Magnet framework for excellence in some detail to better understand its relevance for the international hospital and healthcare community. We argue that the program can be best understood as another method of raising the bar for healthcare outcomes and providing a “customer guarantee” that the care patients receive is world-class.