In an article in The Wall Street Journal, Peter Pronovost, MD, PhD, senior vice president for patient safety and quality at Johns Hopkins Medicine in Baltimore, blamed the often conflicting and confusing clinical quality data from hospitals on a lack of industrywide data standards.
In the article, Dr. Pronovost cited the laurels Johns Hopkins received from one state agency for its low rate of central line-associated bloodstream infections as measured by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention standards, and the organization's subsequent chastisement from another state agency for its poor CLABSI rates because the second agency used a different data standard (billing data, which he said is less accurate).
Dr. Pronovost called for a governing body to ensure data is interpreted using consistent, accurate measures. This body would help to ensure both data accuracy and the actual performance of the reporting organization.
"Today, there are greater protections about what claims we can make about toothpaste than a hospital or measurement organization can make about quality of care," he wrote in the article. "It is the Wild West, and patients are too often left in the dark."
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