U.S. Health Care Quality: Stuck in Neutral
Source: National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA)

A report released today by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) finds that the quality of U.S. health care was virtually stagnant in 2008, a disturbing slowdown after a decade of improvements. The across-the-board trend was seen in care provided to people with private insurance coverage as well as in Medicare and Medicaid. The report also examines the link between higher health care spending and quality and finds little to no connection, a finding with significant implications for health care reform efforts.
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In the report NCQA calls on Congress to: reform payment systems that undermine efforts to improve care; expand quality measurement to the 60% of Americans not currently covered by accountable health plans; invest in measure development, implementation and maintenance to expand what we know about quality; and revitalize the nation’s primary care system. Many of these issues are addressed by the health reform bills now being debated in Congress, but the outcome of those debates remains uncertain.

Improving health care quality would have significant benefits beyond the health care system itself. NCQA estimates that were all health plans able to perform at the level of the top 10 percent of plans, the U.S. would avoid up to 115,000 thousand deaths and save at least $12 billion in medical costs and lost productivity every year.

+ State of Health Care Quality 2009
+ Health Care Quality Report Cards

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 27th, 2009 at 6:12 am and is filed under Consumer issues, Health and healthcare, Health insurance. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.