Web-based reporting credited with state's top healthcare ranking

Web-based reporting credited with state's top healthcare ranking

Madison, Wis. - Hospital officials in Wisconsin are crediting the state's web-based quality reporting system with the state's top ranking in data released by the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

The AHRQ's data shows that Wisconsin had the top overall healthcare quality score among all 50 states based on 129 measures that it used to evaluate healthcare performance.

The state's strongest performance measures included the appropriate discontinuation of antibiotics after surgery, giving a beta-blocker within 24 hours of hospital admission for a heart attack, the number of diabetics who receive an A1c hemoglobin test, and the lowest number of HIV deaths per 100,000 people.

Dana Richardson, vice president of quality initiatives at the Wisconsin Hospital Association (WHA), attributed the state's ranking to its recent focus on measuring and reporting hospital quality. In 2004, WHA launched CheckPoint, a voluntary hospital quality reporting website. “This report confirms what is well known in the area of quality improvement - if you can measure it, you can improve it,” Richardson said in a release.

Through CheckPoint, the state initially focused on 10 quality measures, including the care patients receive when they are hospitalized with pneumonia, heart attack, or congestive heart failure.

WHA President Steve Brenton said the state's status is “clearly the result of private sector public reporting initiatives” and Wisconsin hospitals and physicians that have embraced them. Hospitals have been supported by MetaStar, a quality improvement organization that facilitates learning and sharing best practices.

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