NEW YORK, Oct. 14 (UPI) -- Comparative data on patient safety and hospital quality for nine U.S. states is available online at the Web site WhyNotTheBest.org, a non-profit group says.
Dr. Anne-Marie Audet, vice president for health systems quality and efficiency at The Commonwealth Fund in New York, says the new measures -- developed by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality -- are available from data submitted by hospitals in nine states: Arizona, Florida, New York, Illinois, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Texas, Vermont, and Washington.
The Web site includes information from all payers -- Medicare, Medicaid and private insurers.
Patient safety indicators reflect quality of care for adults cared for in hospitals and focus on potentially avoidable complications and medical mistakes.
The inpatient quality indicators also reflect quality of care for adults inside hospitals and include inpatient mortality for selected medical conditions and procedures such as pneumonia, inpatient heart attack and stroke.
"What makes this data so useful is that it includes all payers and is therefore a much more accurate measure of an organization's performance," Audet says in a statement. "It will also be posted close to the time care is delivered, allowing the information to be used quickly to take action on areas that need improvement."
