Comments on: Are patients looking up quality data before a doctor or hospital visit?

By: Miguel - RxPinoy

Miguel - RxPinoy — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 16:24:00 +0000

I suspect it's not simply a lack of awareness but a disconnect between knowing there's valuable info out there, and realizing that it could really make an impact on their lives as patients.

As an analogy, I knew about Twitter almost a year before I actually considered it to be of any use to me as a website owner.

By: David Harlow - HealthBlawg

David Harlow - HealthBlawg — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 17:48:00 +0000

Data needs to be usable and needs to differentiate between providers. As an example, Massachusetts has taken first steps in this direction, but more work is needed. See http://bit.ly/16fM4

By: Doc99

Doc99 — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 16:57:00 +0000

Perhaps these so-called quality report cards would take on more meaning if patients and not third party payors were responsible for the fees. As long as care is perceived as “free”, the only measure important to prospective patients is participation in their healthplan.

By: Rogue Medic

Rogue Medic — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:33:00 +0000

I agree that it will matter, but right now people do not know what the different quality indicators mean.

Look at JCAHO and Press Gainey. Would you trust either to assess quality?

We need to have a consensus of what indicates quality for different specialties before we can use this kind of information. That is still a long way off.