A broad coalition of leading physician groups, health insurers, consumer and labor organizations, and employer associations have reached a major agreement on physician-performance reporting.
The Patient Charter for Physician Performance Measurement, Reporting and Tiering Programs creates a national set of principles to guide measuring and reporting on physician performance, including third-party independent review of plans’ physician-performance programs.
Groups endorsing the charter include the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Family Physicians, American College of Physicians, AARP, America’s Health Insurance Plans, the Leapfrog Group, the AFL-CIO, the National Business Coalition on Health and major insurers Aetna, Cigna, UnitedHealth Group and WellPoint.
“We believe this builds on the critical New York state agreements between the state attorney general and the health plans,” said Nancy Nielsen, president-elect of the American Medical Association.
The charter calls on health plans to develop consistent, agreed-upon performance measures on cost and quality that are meaningful for consumers; adopt national standards endorsed by the National Quality Forum; use transparent methodology in creating their programs; and give physicians an opportunity to participate and appeal their scores.
Filed by Modern Healthcare, a sister publication of Workforce Management. To comment, e-mail editors@workforce.com.
