Louis Wilson, MD, FACG
Louis J. Wilson, MD, FACG

The Advantages and Challenges of Measuring Patient Experience in Outpatient Clinical Practice

a Four-Part Series in AJG’s Red Section

The ACG Practice Management Committee, under the leadership of Michael S. Morelli, MD, CPE, FACG, developed a paper on measuring satisfaction authored by Louis J. Wilson, MD, FACG, Jay N. Yepuri, MD, and Richard E. Moses, MD.

“The Advantages and Challenges of Measuring Patient Experience in Outpatient Clinical Practice,” is being published as a four-part series in The American Journal of Gastroenterology Red Section, beginning with the April 2016 issue.  All of the sections are available on The American Journal of Gastroenterology web site via Advanced Online Publication.

“The changes that GI practices need to make to survey patients effectively, improve patients’ experience of care, and subsequently do well on CG-CAHPS, will not be easy. Physicians cannot expect to simply hire a vendor and leave it to them. Reading this four-part report will give them the background they need to start that process.” — Dr. Louis J. Wilson

Read an interview with Dr. Wilson on the series from ACG Update

Links to the four-part series in The American Journal of Gastroenterology (login required)

Part 1 Current Medicare Physician Quality Reporting Programs

The transition of health-care from a traditional fee-for-service system to a value-based system will put pressure on physician practice groups to deliver high-quality and cost-effective care while also providing a positive patient experience. It is critical that physician practice groups of all sizes take the necessary preparatory steps. This is the first of a four-section report from the ACG Practice Management Committee that sets out to explain the current quality reporting programs, relate the history of patient satisfaction in health care, explain the relevance of the Clinician and Group Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CG-CAHPS) to clinical practices, and describe methods of acting on results in an effective manner.

Part 2 History of Patient Satisfaction in Health Care

Clinician and Group Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Services (CG-CAHPS) is a standardized survey tool to measure patients’ perception of care provided by physicians in an office setting. Another way to think of CG-CAHPS is as a “sister” survey to the well-known Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems survey for hospitals.

Part 3 Patient Satisfaction and Your Practice

This is the third of a four-section report from the ACG Practice Management Committee that sets out to explain why gastroenterology practices need to improve their patients’ subjective experiences of care by measuring patient satisfaction (PS). First, our reimbursement is going to be tied to PS scores through the Value-Based Payment System.

Part 4 Acting on Patient Satisfaction Results

Measuring and responding to patient satisfaction (PS) is a mandatory Physician Quality Reporting System measure, which is in the process of being tied to reimbursement through the Value-Based Payment Modifier and Merit Based Incentive System, and has simply become a mandatory part of doing business. In this final section of its four-part report, the ACG Practice Management Committee explains how management processes must be developed to correct problems discovered through PS surveys before they negatively affect the Clinician and Group Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems results. Surveying patients about their experience of care at your practice will only be helpful in as far as it is acted upon to improve that experience.