(National Quality Forum: Washington, D.C.) -- To support consumer engagement and improved quality in health care, the National Quality Forum (NQF) endorsed guidelines for consumer-focused, internet-based public reporting. These guidelines will assist report sponsors to present information about hospital quality in an evidence-based and consumer-friendly format that can be used to make informed decisions about health care.

“These guidelines offer public report design and implementation strategies to increase the value and usefulness of publicly reported information for consumers, and to stimulate industry action toward improvement in quality of care, patient safety, and patient-centeredness,” says Janet Corrigan, NQF president and CEO. “Consumers can access reliable information about almost everything they buy, but there is very little consumer-focused information available to make informed decisions about health care.”

Consumers don’t always seek out or use the information available to guide their health care choices. For the most part, public reports have been difficult to understand and use, haven’t adequately communicated what quality of care is, and haven’t convinced consumers to pay attention to quality.

Evidence suggests that health care quality reports and public report cards that contain conflicting information and are poorly constructed may hinder consumers' ability to use the information presented and may lead to decisions inconsistent with their goals. This highlights the need to identify effective public reporting strategies to help change these outcomes.

The seven endorsed guidelines are intended for use by organizations that sponsor and publish public reports such as federal and state governments, consumer organizations, hospital-accrediting organizations, business coalitions, and hospital associations. The guidelines are intended to be used for reporting quality performance of U.S. hospitals, but can be adapted for consumer public reporting of care in other settings.

These consumer-based public reporting guidelines achieve these goals by helping organizations that sponsor public reports to identify the purpose and the intended audience of the report; use a transparent reporting process that involves relevant stakeholders; educate consumers about quality; use measures that are transparent and rigorously tested; present and explain data clearly and objectively; ensure the design of the report helps consumers use and navigate the information presented; and regularly assess and review the contents and relevance of the report.

“Consumers are key players in healthcare. Helping them better understand and use information about the quality of care provided by health organizations and professionals is an important goal,” says Carol Cronin chair of NQF's technical advisory panel on guidelines for consumer-focused public reporting and executive director of the Informed Patient Institute. “The public reporting of performance information to consumers also motivates hospitals and healthcare providers to provide higher quality care.”

Complete descriptions of these guidelines for consumer-focused public reporting and research recommendations are available in the voting report at www.qualityforum.org.