UPDATE: NQF Endorses Additional Outcome Measures For High-Impact Areas

WASHINGTON, Jan. 27, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- To improve the quality and the outcome of care patients receive, the National Quality Forum (NQF) continues to endorse a growing portfolio set of quality measures that assess the outcome, or result, of healthcare. In September 2010, NQF endorsed outcome measures for cardiovascular and pulmonary conditions and care in the intensive care unit.  The 8 newly endorsed outcome measures span a variety of conditions including stroke, pneumonia, acute myocardial infarction, and colorectal surgery.  Measuring and publicly reporting outcome measures like these provide important information for patients and providers about the actual results of healthcare.

"Information garnered from measuring the outcome of healthcare is important for creating a full picture of healthcare quality," said Janet Corrigan, PhD, MBA, president and CEO of NQF.  "It's especially important that NQF has endorsed outcome measures in these common, high-impact areas that affect so many people and account for large portions of healthcare spending. The broad set of outcome measures now endorsed by NQF is a huge step toward giving patients and providers data they can use to make informed decisions about their care and to improve overall quality in these high-impact areas."

The 8 measures newly endorsed by NQF provide important outcome data such as whether the desired outcome was achieved for procedures including colorectal surgery and coronary artery bypass surgery. A full list of endorsed measures follows.

NQF's Steering Committee on patient outcome measures was co-chaired by Joyce Dubow, MUP, senior health care reform director at AARP, and Lee Fleisher, MD, professor and chair of anesthesiology at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

"NQF has endorsed numerous measures of physician quality, but many of them have focused on the processes of care as opposed to outcomes," said Dr. Fleisher.  "The group of endorsed outcome measures go beyond the processes of care and focus on what patients truly care about—the outcomes. These are sophisticated measures that adjust for underlying patient disease so comparisons can be made between groups.  The measures also focus on the outcome after the acute medical condition or hospitalization, a level of accountability particularly relevant to the patient as it assesses the true outcome of hospitalization."

NQF is a voluntary consensus standards-setting organization. Any party may request reconsideration of the recommendations, in whole or in part, by notifying NQF in writing via our web-based form no later than February 24, 2011. (To access the appeals form, go to Patient Outcomes Phase 1 and 2 project page. Then go to the section on appeals and click on the link to the standards directory.) For an appeal to be considered, the notification must include information clearly demonstrating that the appellant has interests that are directly and materially affected by the NQF-endorsed recommendations and that the NQF decision has had (or will have) an adverse effect on those interests.

Endorsed Measures

• Proportion of patients with a chronic condition that have a potentially avoidable complication during a calendar year (Bridges to Excellence [BTE]);
• Proportion of AMI patients that have a potentially avoidable complication (during the index stay or in the 30-day post-discharge period) (BTE);
• Proportion of stroke patients that have a potentially avoidable complication (during the index stay or in the 30-day post-discharge period) (BTE);
• Proportion of pneumonia patients that have a potentially avoidable complication (during the index stay or in the 30-day post-discharge period) (BTE);
• The STS CABG composite score (Society of Thoracic Surgeons);
• Risk Adjusted Case Mix Adjusted Elderly Surgery Outcomes Measure (American College of Surgeons [ACS]);
• Risk Adjusted Colorectal Surgery Outcome Measure (ACS);
• 30-Day Post-Hospital Pneumonia Discharge Care Transition Composite Measure (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services).

The NQF Board of Directors also considered appeals of two measures from the initial stage of the Patient Outcomes project – Intensive Care Unit (ICU) Mortality and ICU Length-of-Stay.  The Board upheld the endorsement of the measures, but with the exclusion of transfers from the measures. 

The National Quality Forum (NQF) operates under a three-part mission to improve the quality of American healthcare by:

• Building consensus on national priorities and goals for performance improvement and working in partnership to achieve them;
• Endorsing national consensus standards for measuring and publicly reporting on performance; and
• Promoting the attainment of national goals through education and outreach programs.

For more information, go to www.qualityforum.org.

SOURCE National Quality Forum