HHS releases first-ever inventory of quality measures

Nov 24 2008

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has released the first-ever inventory of quality measures that are used for reporting, payment, or quality improvement by its agencies and operating divisions.

The HHS measure inventory, which is available on the National Quality Measures Clearinghouse, a Web site of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), is designed to advance collaboration within the quality measurement community and to synchronize measurement. The inventory is available on the clearinghouse Web site at http://www.qualitymeasures.ahrq.gov.

"I am extremely pleased to be unveiling this critically important inventory of quality measures used by HHS agencies, HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt said. "This effort is pivotal to achieving the goal of transparency in quality measurement as a cornerstone of value-driven health care."

Secretary Leavitt added that he called on national, regional, state, and local policymakers, health care executives and clinicians to take advantage of tools the inventory provides; work toward a uniform set of measurements for assessment; and provide clear reports about the quality and value of health care to stakeholders.

Measures for this inventory were contributed by: Administration on Aging, AHRQ, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Health Resources and Services Administration, Indian Health Service, Office of Public Health and Science, National Institutes of Health, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, and Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology.

"The release of this inventory is an important step in providing health care providers, clinicians, patients, policymakers and others with reliable, comprehensive information on the department's efforts to measure and improve health care quality," said AHRQ Director Carolyn Clancy, M.D. "I hope this is the start of a longer term effort for the department to develop further an overarching strategy that can be aligned with public and private efforts to accelerate improvements in quality and value for all Americans."

The measures currently can be sorted by agency or operating division and can be downloaded in their entirety. In the next several months, the inventory will be enhanced so the measure can be sorted by condition, setting, or measure domain. Inquiries regarding measure specifications, updates, or others issues should be directed to [email protected]