National Quality Forum (NQF)

The National Quality Forum (NQF) is a nonprofit organization aiming to improve the quality of American health care. NQF aims to:

• Convene key public and private sector leaders to establish national priorities and goals to achieve health care that is safe, effective, patient-centered, timely, efficient, and equitable;
• Make NQF-endorsed standards the primary standards used to measure and report on quality and efficiency of health care in the United States; and
• Be a major driving force for and facilitator of continuous quality improvement of American health care quality.

To learn more, read NQF’s 2012 Report to Congress.
 
NQF is also responsible for several other activities that support the measure endorsement process and the national quality strategy:

Measure Applications Partnership
The Measure Applications Partnership (MAP) is a public-private partnership convened by NQF. MAP’s sole purpose is to provide input to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on the selection of performance measures for public reporting and performance-based payment programs.
Guided by the priorities and goals of HHS's National Quality Strategy, the MAP Coordinating Committee provides direction and direct input to HHS. Four workgroups advise this Coordinating Committee on measures needed for specific care settings, care providers and patient populations. Each multi-stakeholder workgroup includes individuals with content expertise and organizations particularly affected by the work.

NAPH is proud to have several members on these workgroups, with representation in the Hospital and Dual Eligible Beneficiaries workgroups. NAPH President & CEO Bruce Siegel, MD, and Dr. Ann Marie Sullivan, senior vice president of Queens Health Network, serve on the Hospital Workgroup, while Dr. Steven Counsell, interim medical director for senior care at Wishard Health Services, represents NAPH in the Dual Eligible Beneficiaries Workgroup. These workgroups will be releasing final reports to HHS on June 1st 2012.

Steering Committees
Steering committees involve varied stakeholders to review and recommend measures to go to the Consensus Standards Approval Committee, a standing committee of the NQF Board of Directors, to get NQF endorsement. NAPH has proudly had three members serve on the steering committees for subjects ranging from Palliative Care (Dr. Solomon Liao from UC Irvine) to Population Health (Sue Pickens from Parkland Health & Hospital System) and Patient Safety Measures (Dr. Susan Moffatt Bruce from Ohio State University).

National Priorities Partnership (NPP)
The National Priorities Partnership (NPP) is a multi-stakeholder group convened by NQF to align public and private-sector efforts around a shared vision of improving health and health care. The NPP also provides input to HHS on national priorities and goals. NAPH Vice President for Leadership & Innovation Dr. Jill Steinbrugge is part of the National Priorities Partnership (NPP).

New Tools from NQF
The Quality Positioning System (QPS) helps people more easily find NQF-endorsed measures. Users can create their own lists of measures in customized portfolios to fit specific interests or needs and then share those portfolios with others, as well as view and copy portfolios that others have created. QPS is ideal for organizations that use measures for quality improvement and public reporting, as well as for measure developers, policy analysts and others interested in identifying uses of and discovering potential gaps in measures.