Health Care Reform – It’s about Transparency

Transparency is one of the most important concepts to understand in the transition to value-driven health care.  It directly affects how patients will perceive the care you provide. Note the following from the Health & Human Services web page.

“Transparency is a broad-scale initiative enabling consumers to compare the quality and price of health care services, so they can make informed choices among doctors and hospitals.

In cooperation with America’s largest employers and the medical profession, this initiative is laying the foundation for pooling and analyzing information about procedures, hospitals and physician services. When this data foundation is in place, regional health information alliances will turn the raw data into useful information for consumers.”

 That definition was written and published in 2007, perhaps earlier. When Dr. James Grue and I presented it, whether verbally or in writing, the response was often something like, “Well, that may be true for hospitals but it doesn’t apply to independent optometrists.” More ostrich syndrome!

 One of the most interesting and compelling examples of how precisely transparency applies to every optometrist in the country is seen on the Alabama BCBS website. Check out Find a Doctor. In Doctor Finder, choose Eye Doctor. Select a few doctors to compare. Now look at the tabs: Quality of Care; Surgeries & Procedures; Patient Satisfaction. Note also the Rating Compared to other BCBSAL Network Doctors.

 In professional baseball, we call these batting averages, published for all to see. Fans know where to find them. They memorize them and talk about them constantly among friends. Doctor, these areyour “batting” stats, published for your patients to see. And see them they will. The payers are making sure of that. You’ll note on the home page that big exclamation mark beside Understanding Healthcare Reform».

 And lest we think it’s only the Blues that are so engaged, current legislation requires Medicare to create a “Physician Compare” website modeled on the current website. This is Transparency and it’s not going away.

Alistair Jackson, M.Ed.