First New York Health Care Report Card Released

The New York State Health Accountability Foundation has released the first New York State Health Care Report Card, a unique interactive report on the performance of the state’s health plans and hospitals.

The report card, available at www.AboutHealthQuality.org, provides data on the quality, volume, length of stay and pricing of care provided by health insurers and hospitals. The database is searchable by county.

By clicking on www.AboutHealthQuality.org, employers and consumers alike can compare the performance of a county’s HMOs and hospitals across a range of health conditions and procedures, and contrast this performance with state and national averages. Each hospital’s and HMO’s individual performance on all quality, financial and utilization measures—including HMO premiums and average “list” charges, Medicaid reimbursement and length of stay for hospitals—can also be viewed.

For the HMOs, 26 measures of quality care are included and grouped within the categories Behavioral Health, Medical Care/Chronic Illness, Medical Care/General, Patient Experience and Women’s Health. Hospital performance is reported for 18 measures across the categories Heart Attack, Heart Failure, Pneumonia and Surgical Infection Prevention.

Overall, New York stacks up well against national averages on the quality measures. On average, the state’s HMOs do as well or better than the national average on the 23 measures where nationwide comparisons exist. New York’s hospital performance is as good as or better than the national average on 15 of 18 individual measures.

The report card reveals significant variation in quality of care and cost, both within and between counties and regions of the state. For example, the state average for giving aspirin to heart attack victims on emergency room arrival is 93%. The performance of hospitals in Queens County ranges from 77% to 100%, and Niagara County performance ranges from 80% to 98%. On average, 81% of adult female HMO members nationally and across New York get Pap smears, while HMO members getting the test in both Rensselaer and St. Lawrence Counties range from 75% to 87%, depending on which HMO they belong to. In Westchester County, the range is from 74% to 82%.

HMO premiums also vary. Standard individual premiums in New York County range from $475 to $874 (employer + employee share) per month, while they range from $426 to $929 in Delaware County. Standard family premiums in Bronx County range from $884 to $2,427, and vary from $1,387 to $2,735 in Albany County.

The New York State Health Accountability Foundation is a private-public partnership dedicated to promoting transparency in the health care system and founded by IPRO, a peer review organization, the New York Business Group on Health, and an Advisory Council of major New York employers.