Do Medical Specialists Accept Claims-based Audit and Feedback for Quality Improvement? A Focus Group Study

Overview

Journal BMJ Open

Specialty General Medicine

Date 2024 Apr 8

PMID 38589258

Authors

Vera de Weerdt

Sierk Ybema

Sjoerd Repping

Eric van der Hijden

Hanna Willems

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Objectives: Audit and Feedback (A&F) is a widely used quality improvement (QI) intervention in healthcare. However, not all feedback is accepted by professionals. While claims-based feedback has been previously used for A&F interventions, its acceptance by medical specialists is largely unknown. This study examined medical specialists' acceptance of claims-based A&F for QI.

Design: Qualitative design, with focus group discussions. Transcripts were analysed using discourse analysis.

Setting And Participants: A total of five online focus group discussions were conducted between April 2021 and September 2022 with 21 medical specialists from varying specialties (urology; paediatric surgery; gynaecology; vascular surgery; orthopaedics and trauma surgery) working in academic or regional hospitals in the Netherlands.

Results: Participants described mixed views on using claims-based A&F for QI. Arguments mentioned in favour were (1) A&F stimulates reflective learning and improvement and (2) claims-based A&F is more reliable than other A&F. Arguments in opposition were that (1) A&F is insufficient to create behavioural change; (2) A&F lacks clinically meaningful interpretation; (3) claims data are invalid for feedback on QI; (4) claims-based A&F is unreliable and (5) A&F may be misused by health insurers. Furthermore, participants described several conditions for the implementation of A&F which shape their acceptance.

Conclusions: Using claims-based A&F for QI is, for some clinical topics and under certain conditions, accepted by medical specialists. Acceptance of claims-based A&F can be shaped by how A&F is implemented into clinical practice. When designing A&F for QI, it should be considered whether claims data, as the most resource-efficient data source, can be used or whether it is necessary to collect more specific data.

Citing Articles

The role of guideline organizations in nationwide guideline implementation: a qualitative study.

Thoonsen A, Merten H, Broeders T, Gans A, van Beusekom I, Delnoij D Health Res Policy Syst. 2024; 22(1):174.

PMID: 39716232 PMC: 11668013. DOI: 10.1186/s12961-024-01253-0.

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