Development of the AHRQ QIs and Current Methodological Investigations

• Activity Number: 27
• Type: Topic Contributed
• Date/Time: Sunday, August 4, 2013 : 2:00 PM to 3:50 PM
• Sponsor: Section for Statistical Programmers and Analysts
• Author(s): Dale Rhoda*+ and Jeffrey J. Geppert and Christopher J Sroka and Michele Morara and Warren J Strauss
• Companies: and Battelle Memorial Institute and Battelle Memorial Institute and Battelle Memorial Institute and Battelle Memorial Institute
• Keywords: health care quality ; hospital quality ; risk-adjustment ; quality indicator ; administrative data

Abstract

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Quality Indicators (QIs) are measures of health care quality that use hospital inpatient administrative data to highlight potential quality concerns, identify areas for further study, and track changes over time. Four QI modules represent various aspects of quality: (a) the Prevention Quality Indicators identify hospital admissions (across geographic areas) that may have been avoided through access to high-quality outpatient care; (b) the Inpatient Quality Indicators reflect quality of care inside hospitals, and across geographic areas, including inpatient mortality for medical conditions and surgical procedures; (c) the Patient Safety Indicators reflect quality of care inside hospitals, and across geographic areas, to focus on potentially avoidable complications and iatrogenic events; (d) the Pediatric Quality Indicators adapt indicators from the other three modules for use among children and neonates to reflect quality of care inside hospitals, and across geographic areas, and identify potentially avoidable hospitalizations.

This paper provides a brief overview of AHRQ QI and areas of current methods development work.