Select Quality Care Professional makes available a rich database of publicly-available data from the federal and state governments. We acquire this data, standardize it, and apply industry-accepted severity adjustment algorithms and nationally-recognized quality outcomes and process measures to provide the most comprehensive and current data available for our products.

Customers also have the option of integrating their own claims data to allow easy analysis of cost and quality for their own members. This also provides an opportunity to better analyze outpatient and physician services.

Public Data

Sources of public data include Medicare (MEDPAR), which is collected by the federal government, as well as "All Patient" data which is collected by state agencies such as:

• Arizona (Arizona Department of Health Services)
• California (California Office of Statewide Planning and Development)
• Colorado (Colorado Health and Hospital Association)
• Florida (Florida Department of Health)
• Illinois (Illinois Department of Health)
• Iowa (Iowa Hospital Association)
• Maine (Maine Health Care Finance Commission)
• Maryland (Maryland Health Services Cost Review Commission)
• Massachusetts (Massachusetts Division of Health Care Financing & Policy)
• Nevada (Nevada Division of Health Care Financing & Policy)
• New Hampshire (New Hampshire Department of Health & Human Services)
• New Jersey (New Jersey Health and Senior Services)
• New York (New York State Department of Health)
• North Carolina (North Carolina Hospital Association)
• Oregon (Oregon Association of Hospitals and Health Systems)
• Pennsylvania (Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council)
• Rhode Island (Rhode Island Department of Health)
• Tennessee (Tennessee Department of Health)
• Texas (Texas Department of State Health Services)
• Utah (Utah Department of Health)
• Vermont (Vermont Department of Health)
• Virginia (Virginia Health Information)
• Washington (Washington State Department of Health)
• Wisconsin (Wisconsin Hospital Association)

Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New York, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin include attending physician and operating physician data.

Claims Data

Select Quality Care Professional allows easy, instant, detailed reporting on inpatient and outpatient data. The tool incorporates definitions from the U.S. Agency for Health Care Research and Quality (AHRQ) and includes measures from AHRQ's Patient Safety, Prevention, and Utilization Indicators modules. WebMD Quality Services ensures that these measures are updated and modified throughout the year according to AHRQ's revision process. With over 190 indicators available to choose from, users can make use of the latest measures from AHRQ as well as other industry sources including:

• CMS-Hospital Quality Alliance (CMS-HQA)
• The Leapfrog Group

Severity Adjustment

Select Quality Care Professional incorporates the RDRG methodology developed for the Centers for Medicare and Medicare Services (CMS) by Health Systems Consultants and the optional APR-DRGs from 3M. Both are nationally recognized severity-adjustment methodologies that ensure that analyses and comparisons take into account the severity of patients.