It looks like surgeons are already starting to turn away high-risk patients to improve their scores:
Nuno was furious with the rating. “I’ve had a very illustrious career, and when my name comes out tomorrow I might just retire,” he said in a phone interview. “Nobody in the state is going to write right next to your name that Dr. Nuno tried really hard to keep this patient alive. All it’s going to say is Dr. Nuno is a terrible surgeon.”Nuno warned that some surgeons already are turning away patients with poor outcomes for fear they’ll get tagged as bad doctors.
(via Paul Levy)
