Surgical metrics do not provide a clear path to improvement
Tuesday, February 3, 2015 - 14:01
in Health & Medicine
While surgical outcomes have improved nationally over time, surgical outcome reporting does not necessarily lead to better outcomes, according to a study. The study found no association between hospital-based participation in the NSQIP and improvements in postoperative outcomes over time, suggesting that a surgical outcomes reporting system does not provide a clear mechanism for quality improvement. According to the research team, the failure of these types of outcomes monitoring systems to produce measurable improvements in outcomes may be related to difficulties in identifying mechanisms that translate reports into changes in how surgical care is provided.