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AHIP Endorses “Patient Charter” to Guide Physician Performance Measurement, Reporting
(Washington, DC) – Today, America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) joined other stakeholders, including major physician, consumer, employer, labor, and quality groups in supporting a standard set of guiding principles on physician performance measurement and reporting. These principles, which lay out best practices for health plans, employers, coalitions, and state governments with performance measurement and reporting systems, are outlined in the “Patient Charter” developed by the Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project.
The principles relate to transparency, methodology, standardization, stakeholder input on measurement systems, and validation of programs by independent third parties. “The Patient Charter creates sound, uniform principles for the measurement and public reporting of physician performance. These principles should be endorsed by all stakeholders as the nation moves toward a health care system that values quality and embraces transparency,” said AHIP President and CEO Karen Ignagni.
The health plan community is committed to the concepts incorporated in the “Patient Charter,” which parallels a November 2007 policy statement of its Board of Directors, “Principles for Creating Effective Consumer Health Information Systems.”
The spectrum of quality challenges faced by our health care system, including those identified by the Institute of Medicine and RAND, Inc., several years ago prompted AHIP to collaborate with physicians and other key stakeholders to establish the AQA alliance to support a uniform set of quality measures. Consumers want and need better information on quality and cost of health care, but there had been multiple approaches in the marketplace, which was leading to consumer confusion and an unnecessary burden on physicians. The work of the AQA alliance on uniformity in measures represents a fundamental building block needed for consumer health information systems.
According to Ignagni, “The Charter being announced today represents another major step forward in creating consensus around best practices for using uniform quality measures and constructing performance measurement systems that are transparent and will lead to improvements in care.”
