Information gathering activities include an environmental scan (e.g., review of literature, search for clinical practice guidelines and existing measures, input from experts, other related activities) and empirical data analysis. These activities yield information that will guide prioritization of topics or conditions, gap analysis, the business case, and the compilation of existing related and competing measures. While a part of measure conceptualization, information gathering activities occur in other stages and steps, such as respecification and reevaluation.
Information Gathering Knowledge Base
Comprehensive information gathering should result in a significant knowledge base that yields
- Quality goals
- Relative strength or weakness of scientific evidence pertinent to the topics or conditions of interest
- Environmental scan, which includes a review of literature, search for clinical practice guidelines and existing measures, input from experts, and other related activities
- Information for business case development including exploration of underlying costs associated with the condition, procedure, or health care issue to contribute to an eventual return on investment calculation
- Evidence of either general agreement or diverse and conflicting views on the quality issues pertinent to the topics or conditions of interest
Measure Evaluation
The five measure evaluation criteria—importance, scientific acceptability, feasibility, usability and use, and related and competing measures—serve as a guide for gathering information and for identifying priority topics/conditions and measurement areas. The fifth criterion—consideration of related and competing measures—refers to measure harmonization; measure developers should consider this criterion from the very beginning of the measure development process. See the Measure Harmonization content to learn more.
Information gathering consists of eight steps, which may not occur sequentially:
- Identify the target health care quality issue and determine its priority area by clearly defining the nature of the measure's focus and scope of the measure's construct and its relation to health care needs and quality improvement. The measure developer should consider quality priorities as well as Medicare, Medicaid, and other payor top volume and top cost conditions, as appropriate.
- Conduct an environmental scan (see Conduct an Environmental Scan and the Environmental Scans for Quality Measurement supplemental material)
- Analyze empirical data, when available
- Evaluate information collected during the environmental scan and empirical data analysis
- Conduct a measurement gap analysis to identify areas for new measure development
- Justify creation of a new measure
- Apply measure evaluation criteria
- Prepare an initial list of measures or measure topics
Find additional details about these steps in Conduct an Environmental Scan, Analyze Data and Conduct Gap Analysis, Justify the Creation of New Measures, and the Environmental Scans for Quality Measurement supplemental material. Several templates are available to guide documentation of information gathering (Information Gathering Report Template and Instructions) and measure information and justification (Measure Information and Justification Form and Instructions).
