NQF Begins Work on Cardiac
Surgery Performance Measures Project
February 13, 2004 - The steering committee for the
National Quality Forum's Cardiac Surgery Performance Measures
project met Feb. 9 to develop a standardized set of existing
measures to evaluate the quality of cardiac surgery. The meeting
focused on examining existing measures along with identifying
a framework and criteria to evaluate them.
The steering committee agreed to examine measures in a database
kept by the Society of Thoracic Surgeons because the database
is the most complete existing source of information on the
quality of cardiac surgery. In addition, the steering committee
decided to evaluate the database measures using a modified
version of the framework created in the National Quality Forum's
Hospital Measures project. The steering committee modified
the framework by adding equity and appropriateness as healthcare
aims. Consequently, measures will be evaluated on whether
they address the areas of safety, benefit, patient-centeredness,
timeliness, efficiency, equity, and appropriateness.
There was agreement that the standardized set would contain
some measures that would be suitable for public reporting.
The set would also contain some measures used only for quality
improvement by providers. There was tentative agreement that
scope of the project would focus on coronary artery bypass
graphs (CABGs), valve surgery, and combination valve/CABG
surgery. The steering committee also agreed to limit the scope
of the project by not looking beyond the 30-day mortality
rate. After a discussion on the various types of measures
the steering committee tentatively agreed to look at measures
that focus on the surgical team or the overall institution
instead of measures that focus on individual surgeons.
The steering committee agreed to ask the project's technical
advisory group about the feasibility of including more conditions
in the scope of the project and whether there are any appropriate
surgeon level measures to include in the standardized set.
They also decided to ask the technical advisory group about
different patient sub-populations to consider when evaluating
the measures.
Forum staff will evaluate the measures based on the framework
and criteria agreed upon by the steering committee after receiving
input from the technical advisory panel.
Information:
Jennifer Faerberg, DHCA-Project Director
AAMC, Division of Health Care Affairs
jfaerberg@aamc.org
(202) 862-6221
Jeff Patyk, Staff Specialist
AAMC Health Care Affairs
jpatyk@aamc.org
(202) 828-0498
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