12/09/11

AMDA is one of 39 organizations signing on to a letter to the National Quality Forum (NQF) seeking improvements in the organization?s quality measure?endorsement processes.

The letter states, "In this current health reform environment where statutory requirements are being placed on both Medicare and the private plans as well as physicians to measure and improve quality within specific incentive programs, we need to continue working at aligning our efforts around the development and endorsement of quality measures."

The letter says that the organizations:

--Seek clarification from NQF on its testing requirements and timeframes, specifically when NQF review will require all measures to include tested electronic health record specifications.

--Recommend that NQF institute a staged process for introducing measure specifications and testing results within its endorsement review.

--Urge NQF to change the requirement that the new measure evaluation should be combined with measure-maintenance assessments on a 3-year timetable by system topic. They are asking the NQF to allow more flexibility in establishing separate timeframes for reviewing measure-maintenance assessments vs. new quality measures.

--Offer to work with NQF to address inconsistencies in the measure-review processes of its steering committees.

In addition to AMDA, signers of the letter include the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American College of Cardiology, the American Geriatrics Society, the American Psychiatric Association, the Infectious Diseases Society of America, and the Society of Hospital Medicine.CfA

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