PPACA Care Provisions: Quality Measurements

The PPACA required that the results of the National Quality Strategy be measured by ten outcome measurements each for acute and chronic care diseases and for preventive and primary care. Health and Human Services has contracted with the non-profit National Quality Forum for these measurements. There are currently 598 endorsed quality measures on the NQF website.

Taking the first item on the list, asthma assessment, the American Medical Association-Physician Consortium for Performance Improvement (AMA-PCPI) was put in charge of this quality measurement and produced a standard that was adopted in 2009 and is currently undergoing maintenance. The measurement is published by the HHS Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). For a layperson, a quality asthma assessment consists of at least two office visits in a calendar year by a person 5-40 years of age, at which daytime and night-time asthma symptoms are recorded, quantitative measurements of the person's ability to get air into and out of their lungs are made, asthma attacks are recorded, asthma's effects on the person's quality of life are determined, short-term and long-term drugs are evaluated, along with whether the drugs are actually being bought and used as instructed. Doctor-patient communication  and patient satisfaction are reported by National Asthma Education and Prevention Program/National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NAEPP/NHLBI) guidelines.