Health IT Expert Panel II (HITEP II) 

Final Report: Health Information Technology Automation of Quality Measurement: Quality Data Set and Data Flow 

The HITEP II policy brief has also been published.  

The Opportunity

The second Health Information Technology Expert Panel (HITEP-II) continues the work of HITEP-I, which identified 84 high-priority quality measures, their associated common data types, and a framework to evaluate the quality of electronic information required by performance measures through electronic health records (EHRs). Specifically, HITEP-II and its two workgroups are focusing on recommendations for a standardized Quality Data Set (QDS) and more meaningful quality measurement through improved clinicial dataflows within and across care settings.

The expert panel of 12-18 individuals represents the range of stakeholder perspectives. It will provide strategic direction for the overall effort, as well as oversight for the workgroups. Each workgroup of 15-20 individuals is focused on one part of the effort: one workgroup is developing the QDS and the other is developing the clinical dataflow framework. In addition, panel and workgroup members bring expertise in quality measurement, performance measurement in electronic health records (EHRs) and Health Information Exchanges (HIE), clinical data standards (CDS), and clinical workflows.

Statistics

Measuring quality is a first step toward improving American healthcare. Currently, however, collecting and reporting accurate, comparative healthcare performance data is complex and largely a time-consuming, manual process. Quality improvement leaders have long recognized that the widespread adoption of Health Information Technology (HIT) will automate and simplify these processes by providing electronic information.^{1, 2, 3} Yet to date, the vast majority of electronic health information readily available for quality measurement have been administrative, claims-based data, which include only limited clinical information.

About the Project

This project began in October 2008.

Objectives

Based upon its discussion and deliberations, HITEP-II and its workgroups will recommend a standardized Quality Data Set (QDS) and identify opportunities for quality measurement through improved clinical dataflows within and across care settings.

The revised QDS will provide a base of core data needed to empower automation of quality measurement. The same data set can also bridge clinical guidelines with clinical decision support (CDS), the key effector arm for quality improvement using electronic health records in clinical settings. Once developed, HITEP-II will recommend the QDS to quality stakeholders, including the Healthcare IT Standards Panel.

Process

HITEP-II is not a consensus development project, and does not follow NQF's Consensus Development Process (CDP). Rather, the project is guided by a technical panel and two workgroups. The members of HITEP-II and its two workgroups are reviewing all NQF-endorsed® quality measures, and are considering additional requirements for future cross-cutting, patient-centered measures to define the QDS framework. The initial QDS will then be populated with NQF-endorsed® quality measures. In addition, the dataflow workgroup is reviewing existing automated quality reporting initiatives to identify preferred opportunities for defining the authoritative sources for quality measurement. This environmental scan will inform the creation of the dataflow framework.

Funding

This work is being conducted under a contract from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

Related NQF Work 

Health IT Expert Panel I Project  
Health IT Expert Panel I Final Draft Report

Contact Information

Contact Daniel Rosenthal, MD, MS, MPH, at 202-783-1300 or via email at hitep2@qualityforum.org

Notes

1 National Quality Forum. Information Technology and Healthcare Quality: A National Summit. Washington, DC: NQF; 2003.

2 Corrigan J, Greiner A, and Erickson S. Fostering Rapid Advances in Health Care. Washington, DC: National Academies Press; 2002.

3 National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics. Information for Health: A Strategy for Building the National Health Information Infrastructure. Washington, DC: Department of Health and Human Services; 2001.