The NCQA, a nonprofit group that evaluates health plan quality, uses its proprietary “HEDIS” data set to measure health care quality. Health plans that make public the HEDIS score are proving more effective.
The article uses the following examples:
In the area of completeness of adolescent immunizations, for example, all commercial health plans that participate in the main performance reporting program have increased their effectiveness score to 53.7% in 2005, from 41.6% in 2003. Plans that make their HEDIS scores available to the public reported an average adolescent immunization effectiveness score of 55.2% in 2005, compared with an average score of just 37.6% for plans that keep their HEDIS results secret, NCQA officials report.
NCQA officials went on to comment on the need for a concerted effort in order to make transparency the norm:
Spreading the benefits of transparency and accountability to the millions of Americans currently in the dark will require enormous political will and the concerted efforts of consumers, purchasers, health care providers and thought and policy leaders.
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