This year marks NCQA’s 20th anniversary as an independent agent charged with improving health care quality. In our first two decades, NCQA rewrote the health care dictionary by introducing the concepts of transparency, accountability and value. When we began our mission, critics argued that health care quality could not be measured. NCQA innovations like Quality Compass, the Health Plan Report Card, American’s Best Health Care Plan rankings and our annual State of Health Care Quality Report proved the naysayers wrong and helped make quality part of the health care conversation.
Today, accredited health plans face more than 60 rigorous standards and must report their performance in more than 40 clinical areas to earn NCQA’s seal of approval. NCQA Physician Recognition Programs help consumers, employers and health plans identify physicians who demonstrate that they provide their patients with the evidence-based care they need.
Looking ahead to the next 20 years, those of us who care about quality must tackle the related problems of cost, waste and inefficiency so that care is both good and affordable. After all, unaffordable coverage is a tremendous barrier to getting quality care.
Part of the solution is to bring measurement, accountability and transparency closer to consumers, and make patients the center of care. We also need better ways to measure efficiency – that delicate intersection of quality and costs. And we need to change our payment systems to reward quality and efficiency, instead of volume and traditionalism.
The quality movement has come a long way since 1990.
Click here to view NCQA milestones over 20 years.