"You can't manage what you can't measure."

W. Edwards Deming		Peter Drucker

That quote is sometimes attributed to W. Edwards Deming and sometimes to Peter Drucker. The fact that the attribution is given to two very intelligent business managers is a testament to the general esteem in which the concept is held. The concept applies to the healthcare industry as much as to any other. That said, any practicing physician will tell you that there are limits to the data you can collect in situations where decisions must be made anyway. While most physicians would greatly prefer to practice only evidence-based medicine, that simply isn't possible. Hospital administration would also like metrics that show the organization's performance over time but that is more possible.

There is a well known source of such data published by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Interestingly enough, most organizations look at it as a marketing tool (which it can be) but nothing more. Ashbec LLC has developed a reporting system that can allow you to compare the performance of a medical facility against other facilities of your choice. You might wish to look at the performance of several different facilities that are all part of the same health system. You may be interested in looking at the performance of competitors in a geographic area. You may wish to look at peer organizations across the country. Ashbec LLC has started with the patient safety data and converted the metrics into national percentile rankings that allow these comparisons. Clients can look at performance metrics published by CMS converted to quarterly percentile rankings going back to the fourth quarter of 2017. (Looking at the trends over time does give a totally different perspective than simply looking at the most recently published data.) Clients can also define combinations of metrics that provide insight across practice areas or overall performance. All of this can be done at very affordable prices. If you would like more information on the data that is already available and how you can customize your own reports, click here or contact us using the menus at the top of the screen.