All but 10 of the 50 U.S. states have failed to find ways to provide their residents with meaningful information on physician quality.
That's the shocking tale told by the "50 State Report Card on Physician Quality Transparency" released by the Health Care Incentives Improvement Institute.
The Institute performed a rigorous study of available information related to physician quality and transparency — a topic that, it noted, has been around for nearly 15 years with little to show for the effort.
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Only two states — Washington and Wisconsin — received an "A" for their physician quality and transparency information data bases. California managed to eke out a "C," and seven states struggled to get "D" grades.
The rest? "F" for fail.
"Finding information on the quality of physicians remains elusive for most consumers," the Institute wrote on its website in discussing the report card.
"In its seminal publications on the Quality of Health Care in America, the Institute of Medicine called for the measurement and reporting of physician quality. That was in 1999 and 2000. … Close to 15 years after the IOM's Crossing The Quality Chasm, we have no idea, for the most part, on the quality of care delivered by the majority of clinicians in the U.S. That's not just shameful, it puts patients at risk every day, and we hope that highlighting States that have made a conscious effort to provide these data to consumers will encourage others to embark on similar efforts."
The full report can be found here.
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Dan Cook
Dan Cook is a journalist and communications consultant based in Portland, OR. During his journalism career he has been a reporter and editor for a variety of media companies, including American Lawyer Media, BusinessWeek, Newhouse Newspapers, Knight-Ridder, Time Inc., and Reuters. He specializes in health care and insurance related coverage for BenefitsPRO.
