MA lists death rates for individual heart doctors
Starting December 18, Massachusetts officials will begin publishing death rates for individual heart surgeons on a publicly accessible website. The site will offer mortality rate information on 55 surgeons who perform cardiac bypasses, one of the most common operations. In New York, where surgeon mortality data has been available since 1991, officials say the program has lowered death rates. Massachusetts surgeons, for their part, have expressed concern that public reporting will discourage doctors from accepting sicker patients with a greater risk of death, despite the fact that the state plans to adjust the data to factor in the severity of each doctor's case mix. Meanwhile, studies haven't demonstrated one way or the other whether the improved mortality rates shown in New York are due to risk-averse behavior by surgeons.
Get more background on the initiative:
- read this Boston Globe article
PLUS: The CEO of a large Boston hospital thinks that reporting mortality rates is fine, but takes issue with the data the state is using. Blog
Related Article:
Consumer's take on surgeon ratings. Report
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Comments
By Mike Wei, MD | Posted 11:25am | December 10, 2006
Dear Ann
Every so called smart action by bureaucrat is balanced by incomplete thought process.
In NY States, I knew of patients not being accepted for transfer for cardiac surgery because of high risk.
This type of reporting only make sense if the mortality and acuity of the patients are both reported.
I am not a Cardiac surgeon, but in order for the public to use the informations, they have to know what is the surgical risk and what is the condition of the patients.
Knowing only half the facts can lead to inappropriate decisions
Yours truly
Mike Wei MD
By Anonymous | Posted 3:04pm | January 14, 2007
Careful: By that standard, nothing would ever be published. Check my blog for some recent statistics that can be very useful. www.runningahospital.blogspot.com.
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