NQF President and CEO Christine Cassel, MD, and other quality leaders recently outlined strategies to spur advancement in performance measurement in a recent New England Journal of Medicine Perspective, “Getting More Performance from Performance Measurement.”

The authors highlight the critical role of measurement in reducing preventable readmissions and early elective deliveries. They also cite the lessons learned from “unintended consequences” of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services quality measure for community-acquired pneumonia, which led to inappropriate antibiotic use in some patients.

According to the authors, strategies to impel dramatic advances in performance measurement include enhanced focus on patients, increased use of electronic clinical information, aligning measures across payers, and consolidating requirements from accrediting and certifying bodies. The authors also made recommendations for specific healthcare stakeholder groups, such as suggesting that clinicians develop and implement measures relevant to their practice and build the necessary data-collection infrastructure to mine data for opportunities to improve care.

“Although we’ve come a long way, there’s much more that the healthcare community can do to effectively employ performance measurement so that patients get the high-quality care they deserve,” said Dr. Cassel. “Advances in the science and practice of performance measurement, improved transparency in results, and the increased investment that all stakeholder groups have in getting more out of measurement are key to driving continued improvement.”