H.C. Quality:Wild Card

This is my last assignment for this class. I just finished posting my responses to other students quality improvement projects. I am happy that it was an assignment. I enjoyed looking at other students work. It almost works as a comparison to understand what I may have done wrong or misinterpreted. This helps me to do higher quality work in the future.

For my wild card I am going to do a current event in the news related to health care quality. The article is titled, Doctors critize insureres over ranking and it from the wallstreet juornal. The raticle talks about how doctos are critizing insurers for ranking groups based on cost or quality. They say it is swaying the popion of paients on where they seek care. Insurers say they are working to ensure that the rating are accurate and transparent. Consumers can get lower out of pocket charges if they see a doctor in a preferred ranking. Doctors are saying that these rankings are unreliable and often inaccurate. Doctors can be ranked higher is they order less "questionable" tests or if they have more favorable patient outcomes.

I think it is a good thing that insurance companies are doing this. Not only does it help to control costs overall for health care but it also helps the patient make a more informed decision on where they seek health care. If the rating are accurate and reliable then they are serving a purpose. This is something that could be regulated by a third party to ensure that the rating are not bias. I can see a few flaws in this. Doctors may be more inclined to order less test if they re being rated on the fact that they may have ordered a questionable test. This could result is less quality of care for the patient. This could also reduce access to care if the Doctor began to refuse the type of insurance all together. The Doctor may decide to switch to accepting a different insurance in place that doesn't use ranking. This could hinder access for the patient.