COMPREHENSION OF QUALITY CARE INDICATORS - DIFFERENCES AMONG PRIVATELY INSURED, PUBLICLY INSURED, AND UNINSURED

This study explores consumers' comprehension of quality indicators app earing in health care report cards. Content analyses of focus group tr anscripts show differences in understanding individual quality indicat ors and among three populations: privately insured; Medicaid; and unin sured. Several rounds of coding and analysis assess: the degree of com prehension; what important ideas are not understood; and what exactly is not understood about the indicator (interrater reliability exceeded 94 percent). Thus, this study is an educational diagnosis of the comp rehension of currently disseminated quality indicators. Fifteen focus groups (5 per insurance type) were conducted with a total of 104 parti cipants. Findings show that consumers with differing access to and exp eriences with care have different levels of comprehension. Indicators are not well understood and are interpreted in unintended ways. Impli- cations and strategies for communicating and disseminating quality inf ormation are discussed.