[medinformatics] Report Details State by State Quality Comparisons

[Medical Informatics News]

The government recently unveiled a new Web site comparing the nation’s hospitals to each
other when it comes to treating patients with cancer or heart problems. Yesterday, it released data from 2003 showing
where states and the District of Columbia rank in other specific categories.

The rankings indicate how well each state is performing on 14 selected measures of health care quality. Those
measures are featured in the 2004
National Healthcare Quality Report. Categories include prenatal care, flu vaccination for the elderly, the
percentage of Medicare patients hospitalized for pneumonia who were prescribed the correct antibiotics and the
percentage of nursing home residents who have moderate to severe pain.


Officials at the Department of Health and Human Services hope that showing
states how they compare with their peers will bring extra emphasis in those categories where a state isn’t doing
well.
Quoted in Long Island Newsday, Dr. Carolyn Clancy, director of the
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, said: “As health professionals and as
citizens, we should be feeling shock and awe when we see these chaotic differences in quality of care.”



PDF of the 112-page report available
here.

Chicago Tribune coverage
here.


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