Framework helps consumers know quality
Framework helps consumers know quality
FAACT sets agenda for new way of reporting
Consumers want to know about the quality of their health plans and medical groups, but they often don’t understand quality report cards, and they don’t use them.1
The Foundation for Accountability (FAACT), a health care consumer and purchaser coalition in Portland, OR, is trying to bridge that gap with a new framework for communicating quality information.
"We’re trying to help people understand that they should have a broader set of expectations about quality," says Doug Davidson, FAACT’s director of communications. "There is, in fact, great variation across providers and across markets. You need to understand that the quality performance of the plan and provider you choose has great impact on your health and your family’s health."
FAACT identified five areas of performance measures for plans and providers:
1. The Basics (basics of good care such as access, communication, skill, coordination of care, and follow-up).
2. Staying healthy (preventive care).
3. Getting better (treatment of illness).
4. Living with illness (helping the chronically ill improve their quality of life).
5. Changing needs (caring for people and their families when health needs or functional abilities change dramatically).
As a part of this framework, FAACT is identifying existing performance measures and working with other health care organizations to develop new measures. Developing appropriate measures in all categories could take two to five years, Davidson says.
"We need more focused measures that track actual outcomes and the patient experience with clinical care, not just the service aspects of care," he says.
Eventually, FAACT may develop a scoring system for overall scores in each of those categories, so consumers could receive either general scores or more specific information, says Davidson.
Meanwhile, FAACT is working with health care purchasers and consumer groups to educate consumers about quality. "One of the reasons we’re interested in educating people about quality is to create a demand for this (report card) information," Davidson says.
Reference
1. Hibbard JH, Jewett JJ. Will quality report cards help consumers? Health Affairs 1997; 16:218-228.
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