Grading Health Care: The Science and Art of Developing Consumer Scorecards

In today's competitive health care marketplace, providers, corporate and public purchasers, and health care executives are focusing their attention on quality, value, and accountability. At the same time, employers and state Medicaid programs are demanding providers and insurers to produce accurate accounts of their services. These conditions speak loudly to the growing need for consumer-oriented measurement tools and report cards.

In Grading Health Care, editors Pamela P. Hanes and Merwyn R. Greenlick provide health care practitioners, administrators, and policymakers the information and guidance they need to create consumer scorecards that can reliably measure customer satisfaction. Written by pioneers in the field, the book examines Oregon Consumer Scorecard Consortium's successful efforts to develop the first health care plan scorecard program. Hanes and Greenlick share the lessons learned from the consortium's efforts to create dependable methods for measuring consumer satisfaction and guiding consumers to make informed choices among health plans. Grounded in both theory and practice, this book offers valuable resources that practitioners can use:
· A discussion of the dimensions of health care delivery that consumers want most
· A timely introduction to the science of developing consumer satisfaction surveys and quality performance measurements
· Much-needed information on how to manage various stakeholders' interests, from state bureaucrats to consumer groups
· A thoughtful and realistic analysis of both the promise and the limitations of consumers scorecards
Grading Health Care provides a dependable resource and toolkit that can help health care professionals answer the critical question: How well is our health care plan serving the needs of our customers?