Accountability In Healthcare

Healthcare-associated infection (HAI), or nosocomial infection, develops when a patient receiving treatment in a healthcare setting acquires an infection secondary to their original condition. These serious and costly adverse outcomes of medical care affect nearly two million people in the United States annually and lead to substantial morbidity and mortality. With increased days of hospitalization and direct medical costs, HAIs account for an estimated $20 billion per year in national health care expenditure every year. As such, they present one of the major threats to patient safety and remain a critical challenge to public health. On any given day, approximately one in 25 patients contracts at least one infection while receiving healthcare …show more content…
Preventable outbreaks ensuing from lapses in infection control procedures, particularly in outpatient and non-hospital settings, have fueled the regulatory actions requiring healthcare facilities to collect nosocomial infection data intended for public disclosure. Legislation requiring HAI reporting is not revolutionary, but is rather latest development in the movement to raise the quality of health care and the accountability standards of healthcare providers. The College of American Physicians supports “the goal of performance transparency for services…provided by all healthcare stakeholders to patients.” Accordingly, healthcare organizations have a responsibility to publicly provide accurate data and performance information to consumers. Availability of valid data on HAI rates enables individuals to make more informed healthcare decisions that are consistent with their needs and circumstances. Correcting the information asymmetry also helps foster trust in the patient-physician relationship and in the health care system, in …show more content…
Publicly reported HAI rates can be misleading if inaccurate information is distributed, or if fluctuations in infection rates are misinterpreted. Based on experience with the National Nosocomial Infections Surveillance System, the CDC noted that inter-facility comparisons using overall HAI rates are crude and unreliable, due to the lack of comprehensive risk adjustment methods. Mandatory public reporting that does not utilize established surveillance methods and realistic objectives may deflect resources away from patient care and prevention and towards reporting infections and collecting data for risk adjustment. Such reporting could result in unintentional disincentives to treat patients with increased susceptibility to HAI. Since 2008, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services have limited supplemental payments for costs of care associated with certain HAIs. Unless HAIs are consistently assessed and providers are held responsible for legitimately preventable outcomes, mandatory public disclosure of HAI rates could potentially perpetuate an unjust system and penalize providers who look diligently for