National Voluntary Consensus Standards for Hospital Care: An Initial Performance Measurement Set

Publication Date: May 2006

Publisher: The National Quality Forum; Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Author(s): The National Quality Forum

Research Area: Health

Type: Report

Abstract:

Despite this country's tremendous investment in, and dependence on, hospital care, standardized and uniform measures of hospital performance quality are not widely available and are rarely publicly reported. Efforts to collect such data place undue burden on hospitals and the little information that is available to the public often cannot be used to compare among hospitals. This National Quality Forum (NQF) report provides detailed information on 39 voluntary consensus standards for hospital care quality. This is the first set of nationally standardized performance measures endorsed by NQF. The 39 standards are spread across eight condition-specific and cross-cutting priority areas for measurement. The priority areas were identified as high-volume inpatient conditions that represent important aspects of inpatient care. The standards include: aspirin at arrival for acute myocardial infarction, use of relievers for inpatient pediatric asthma and smoking cessation advice for pneumonia. By reporting and tracking these measures and making the results publicly available, consumers will be able to select high-quality hospital care. This action may help to drive the improvement of care by hospitals across the United States and create incentives to catalyze value-based purchasing.