The GAAP in Quality Measurement and Reporting
- Peter J. Pronovost, MD, PhD;
- Marlene Miller, MD, MSc;
- Robert M. Wachter, MD
- Author Affiliations: Departments of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine (Dr Pronovost) and Pediatrics (Dr Miller), Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland; and Department of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco (Dr Wachter).
- Corresponding Author: Peter J. Pronovost, MD, PhD, 1909 Thames St, Second Floor, Baltimore, MD 21231 (ppronovo{at}jhmi.edu).
Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text.
Catalyzed by evidence of poor-quality care and remarkable variations in processes and outcomes, the interest in quality measurement has increased exponentially. Manifestations of this interest include widespread promulgation of quality measures, an increase in public reporting of these measures, and early experiments in paying for quality.1-2 Now that quality of care is being measured rather than assumed, there seems little doubt that better quality scores will lead to major competitive advantages for clinicians and organizations.
Although many quality measures are used internally by health care organizations to improve quality of care, an increasing number of measures are being reported publicly. Yet the measurement of quality in health care is neither standardized nor consistently accurate and reliable. Because any organization or company can advertise the quality of its products, it is important to hold health care quality measures to a higher standard than claims about, for example, household …
