Summary

Description

The Secretary of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the VA's Under Secretary for Health are committed to transparency - giving Americans the facts. The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) releases the quality goals and measured performance of VA health care in order to ensure public accountability and to spur constant improvements in health care delivery. The success of this approach is reflected in our receipt of the Annual Leadership Award from the American College of Medical Quality. Much of the data in LinKS and ASPIRE are simply not measured in other health systems VA is raising the bar. When available, VA uses outside benchmarks but often sets VA standards or goals at a higher level. VA scores hospitals more than 30% different from the goal as underperforming or red and those only 10% different from the goal are shown in green in ASPIRE. But a red site within the VA might be a good performer compared to outside counterparts. The scoring system is designed to move VA forward. ASPIRE is not about finding fault but about helping VA to target opportunities for improving performance. ASPIRE is a dashboard that documents quality and safety goals for all VA Hospitals. This data shows strengths and opportunities for improvement at the national, regional and local hospital level. Aspire data supports the VA�s mission of a continuous health care improvement program to provide the best possible care to Veterans. The database lists many measures and our goal for each measure. The data shows where we are in comparison to where we want to be. A simple example would be for blood pressure management. The goal for all veterans age 18-85 with high blood pressure is to have blood pressure readings less than 140/90. This measure shows the percentage of Veterans meeting that blood pressure goal. The data in this dashboard will be updated on a regular basis. VA�s Linking Information Knowledge and Systems (LinKS) is a dashboard that documents outcome measures for acute care, ICU, outpatient, safety and annual measures. This data shows strengths and opportunities for improvement at the national, regional and local hospital levels. LinKS supports the VA mission to provide the best possible care to the Veterans. The dashboard shows what we are measuring and our result. A simple example would be for smoking. We measure the percentage of veterans that smoke and what we�ve done to help them stop smoking such as smoking cessation classes, counseling or medication to help them quit. The data will be updated on a regular basis.