Quality Metrics in Hand Surgery: A Systematic Review

Abstract

Purpose: The enactment of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in 2010 placed an emphasis on measuring the quality of care. However, the issue of how best to measure quality remains in question. Although some surgical specialties frequently rely on quality measures such as the mortality rate, measuring quality in hand surgery necessitates the use of metrics beyond this traditional scope. A review was performed of the potential quality metrics used in the hand surgery literature published after the Affordable Care Act was enacted, to identify current trends in quality measurement and guide efforts to improve the quality of care in hand surgery.

Methods: We searched the PubMed and EMBASE databases to identify original research articles within hand surgery to assess how care is being measured. Data extracted from the articles included study characteristics, quality metrics, and the domain(s) of quality.

Results: A total of 7,308 articles were identified, and 63 prospective and retrospective articles were included in the analysis. The most common quality measure reported in the hand surgery literature was an outcome measure (100%) and the least common was a structure measure (30.2%). The most common metrics were pain (44.4%) and patient-reported measures (41.3%). Effectiveness (42.9%) was the most frequently assessed domain of quality, whereas efficiency (3.2%) was the least studied.

Conclusions: We identified quality measures used in contemporary hand surgery literature and found a substantial variation in the representation of quality metrics. Structure and process measures can be leveraged to provide a more holistic assessment of the quality of care in hand surgery.

Clinical relevance: Although outcome measurements are critical to understanding effectiveness, structure and process measures should be considered and reported as necessary, because these metrics may influence treatment outcomes and the development of quality measures.

Keywords: Care quality; hand surgery; quality metrics; value-based care.