Abstract
The Dutch health care system is subject to radical changes. In January 2006, a new insurance and payment system will become operative. The new system will be market-driven and gives health care consumers freedom to choose the insurance policy and health care provider that fit their needs best. To 'empower' health care consumers for this new role, the Dutch government is working on a system of up-to-date, accessible and confidential quality information. Performance indicators will play a very important role in such a system. This article starts with a discussion about the suitability, sensibility and desirability of performance indicators for informing health care consumers. After that, the authors describe their study about health care consumers' information needs and the state of affairs of existing performance indicators in Dutch health care. A literature study was performed, 27 qualitative interviews were held with representatives of consumer and provider organizations and a document research was carried out. The study reveals some very paradoxical situations in the field of health care quality information. Much information is already collected, but is not accessible for the individual health care consumer. Besides there's also a growing number of consumer information initiatives, although nobody seems to know what information consumers are actually interested in. The article therefore concludes with some focusing proposals for a research and policy agenda.
Translated title of the contribution | Performance indicators for health care consumers |
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Original language | Dutch |
Pages (from-to) | 25-49+101 |
Journal | Acta Hospitalia |
Volume | 45 |
Issue number | 1 |
Publication status | Published - 2005 |