AHRQ reports show quality improvement for hospitals, but existing disparities in minority care

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality yesterday released two reports that summarize many of the issues with which healthcare professionals and specifically those in quality improvement struggle.

The National Healthcare Quality Report for 2008 highlights strategic areas to measure whether the quality of care in the U.S. is getting better–or not. Although quality within hospitals improves annually by 3%–the most out of all care settings, some of the findings related to patient safety within hospitals are nothing short of a rude awakening:

• One in seven adult patients is the victim of at least one medical error
• Hospital compliance with the six core indicators in the report have declined about 1%
• 40% of all hospital-acquired infections are the result of catheter-associated urinary tract infections

You can find the full report here for futher details. The report details some suggestions for the future, such as standardizing patient safety measures and better collecting patient safety data.

The National Healthcare Disparities Report, also released yesterday, shows that disparities do indeed still exist as far as access to healthcare and quality of healthcare goes. For African Americans, Asians, Hispanics, Alaska natives/ American Indians, and poor people, 60% of quality measures either stayed the same or got worse. Some progress is being made, however, in reducing the occurrence of certain illnesses that disproportionately affect one minority.