Several resources, both governmental and commercial, provide information on quality, cost and satisfaction to consumers. CMS’ Hospital Compare website provides data in several areas: process of care measures, provided by hospitals to show whether facilities provide recommended care for various diagnoses; outcome of care measures, compiled by CMS to show 30-day risk-adjusted death and readmission rates for Medicare patients; and patient hospital experience results, compiled from the HCAHPS survey to provided a standardized set of data around patient satisfaction. The website also displays Medicare inpatient hospital payment information, giving a resource to cost-savvy customers looking to avoid inflated prices for common procedures.
While state public reporting initiatives are by no means standardized across the country, various states have taken steps to provide hospital quality data to their residents. According to a 2010 article published in Health Affairs, 25 states had programs that reported about hospital quality, though information varied considerably from state to state. In Jan. 2010, the Washington State Department of Health announced the opening of its hospital infection rate website to report on central line bloodstream infections and ventilator-associated pneumonia. The New York State Department of Health website aims to publish regular information on hospital-acquired infections by individual hospital and region, and the New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services website lets consumers compare N.J. hospitals in a similar format to Hospital Compare.
Unsurprisingly, commercial organizations are in on the action as well. HealthGrades and Consumer Reports, two of the most well-known ratings organizations that publicize data on hospitals, provide quality and cost information for thousands of facilities across the country. The inclusion of hospitals and providers on Consumer Reports indicates that the healthcare industry — long exempt from the cost and service expectations of other sectors — is now receiving equal scrutiny.
The ease of access to these resources may prove frightening for under-performing hospitals. If consumers are expected to slog through pages of dense documents to uncover outcomes information, hospitals can assume the number of knowledgeable patients will stay small. On these websites, however, patients can enter the name of a hospital or location and quickly see telling numbers on infection rates and patient experience. For example, the first data point on Hospital Compare’s patient experience page details the percentage of patients who reported their nurses “always” communicated well during the hospital stay. To remain competitive, hospitals must prepare for coming era of the savvy healthcare consumer.
Read more on transparency in hospitals:
–8 Steps to Building a Truly Transparent Hospital
