While the average person may view all hospitals the same way, there are often key differences that can affect the patient’s treatment outcome and long term recovery. As part of the health reform movement in the U.S., the federal government is creating tools to allow people to compare a variety of quality measures. Americans now have access to new information that can be used to take a more active role in choosing health care facilities.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has added new data on its website enabling people to compare the quality of services at 4,700 acute care, critical access and children’s hospitals. The data also covers outpatient and emergency departments, including how well hospitals care for patients with heart attacks.
The information is part of the Compare Care Quality section found at http://www.healthcare.gov/compare/index.html and can also be found on the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) Hospital Compare website, www.hospitalcompare.hhs.gov.
“The more information consumers and patients have, the better the options and choices are for them when it comes to their health care. HealthCare.gov is designed to put the power of information at the fingertips of Americans and our quality compare tools are a critical part of this new website,” said HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.
“By reporting data on services provided in hospital settings like imaging on Hospital Compare, we can highlight the importance of this issue for patients and their families,” said Acting CMS Administrator Marilyn Tavenner. “For some time, Medicare beneficiaries have had access to reasonable and necessary imaging technologies, which have revolutionized how well doctors and patients diagnose and treat a host of diseases. But by adding information to the website, we can help patients and their families to understand the risks associated with these technologies and talk with their doctors about which hospitals are most likely to help patients reduce those risks.”
On average, one in three Medicare beneficiaries receive magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of their lower back when they complain of pain, rather than trying more recommended – and potentially safer – treatment first, such as physical therapy. While most practitioners use imaging technology, such as MRI, safely and effectively to diagnose or treat disease, studies show that overusing MRIs for lower back pain could cause patients unnecessary stress, risk, and cost. In other cases, such as computed tomography (CT) scans, imaging technology exposes patients to the radiation used to produce these images, which means that overuse could harm patients’ health.
The updated information on HealthCare.gov’s Hospital Compare includes data on the rates of outpatient MRIs for low back pain, outpatient re-tests after a screening mammogram, as well as two ratios that explain how frequently outpatient departments gave patients “double” computed tomography (CT) scans when a single scan may be all that is needed. Hospital Compare also includes new measures that show whether outpatients who are treated for suspected heart attacks receive proven therapies that reduce mortality such as an aspirin at arrival, and how well outpatient surgical patients are protected from infection.
The HealthCare.gov Hospital Compare tool will show whether a hospital’s mortality or readmissions rate is “Better than,” “No different from,” or “Worse than” the U.S. national rate. This information includes each hospital’s risk-standardized mortality rate (RSMR), an estimate of the rate’s certainty, and the number of eligible cases for each hospital. By posting hospital RSMRs, interval estimates, and the number of eligible cases, CMS is giving consumers and communities additional insight into the performance of their local hospitals in hopes that this will prompt all hospitals to work toward achieving the level of the top-performing hospitals in the country.
Hospital Compare also includes ten measures that capture patient satisfaction with hospital care as well as 25 process of care measures and three children’s asthma care measures. The site also features information about the volume of certain hospital procedures performed and conditions treated for Medicare patients and what Medicare pays for those services.
The information contained on HealthCare.gov and Hospital Compare is available for consumers to use in making health care decisions. However, consumers should gather information from multiple sources when choosing a hospital. In an emergency situation, patients should always go to the nearest, most easily accessible facility.