Measuring outcomes: the key to quality management

Issue title: Selected Proceedings from the 1996 Review Course in Pain Medicine and the 12th Annual Conference of the American Academy of Pain Medicine

Guest editors: Edward C. CovingtonGuest Editor and Richard LinchitzGuest Editor

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Stieg, Richard L.^*;

Affiliations: Colorado Compensation Insurance, 720 South Colorado Boulevard, Suite 100, North Tower, Denver, CO, USA

Correspondence: [*] Corresponding author. Tel.: + 1 303 7824206; fax: + 1 303 7824205.

Abstract: Managed care continues to encroach upon virtually all health care delivery systems. Cost controls within these systems have been governed in the past by selection/deselection procedures and utilization management that are primarily based upon claims cost data. The recent movement toward integration of health care quality measures with financial data offers some hope that quality will not be unduly compromised in the efforts to control health care costs. In this new milieu there are increasing opportunities for health care professionals to participate in the development and refinement of managed care products. A model for a worker's compensation managed care system being developed in Colorado is offered as an example of the movement toward more meaningful partnering between health care payers and providers.

Keywords: Managed care, Cost controls, Worker's compensation, Health care

DOI: 10.3233/BMR-1996-7203

Journal: Journal of Back and Musculoskeletal Rehabilitation, vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 97-101, 1996