The California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF) today announced a planning grant of $240,000 to the Institute for Health Policy Study at the University of California, San Francisco, to explore creating a California Hospital Report Card. Collaborators include the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations and the California Institute for Health Systems Performance.

This initiative aims to establish consensus on a comprehensive set of quality measures for all California hospitals. The grant will fund the creation of an implementation plan supported by a sustainable funding model and strategies on how to best report information to the public, including consumers, health plans, and purchasers. This project will be completed by early 2005.

According to Jim Barber, CEO of the Hospital Association of Southern California, "We hope the results of this effort will educate and engage patients concerning their health care choices by providing meaningful and valid hospital quality information. We strongly support this initiative."

This effort brings together relevant stakeholders to identify key measures of hospital performance for public reporting. R. Adams Dudley, M.D., M.B.A., an associate professor of medicine and health policy at UCSF, is the principal investigator. Ken Kizer, M.D., M.P.H., president and CEO of the National Quality Forum, will chair the initiative’s steering committee, which will include members representing hospitals, health plans, research entities, accrediting bodies, government, employers, and consumer groups.

Mark D. Smith, M.D., M.B.A, and president and CEO of CHCF said, "Patients and purchasers currently can get information on patients' experiences in hospital, but reliable data on hospitals' clinical quality is hard to come by. We hope that a standardized 'report card' will reduce the confusion that exists for patients and hospitals about what figures are meaningful."

More information about this initiative can be found through the link below.