New AHRQ Views Blog Posts: AHRQ at AcademyHealth’s 2018 Annual Research Meeting

AHRQ Stats: Care Provided by Nurse Practitioners and Physician’s Assistants

About 54 percent of adults who saw their usual source of care provider in 2015 visited a practice that had two or more nurse practitioners or physician’s assistants. (Source: AHRQ, Medical Expenditure Panel Survey Statistical Brief #509: Characteristics of Practices Used as Usual Source of Care Providers during 2015, by Age—Results from the MEPS Medical Organizations Survey.)

Today's Headlines:

• New AHRQ Views Blog Posts: Highlighting AHRQ’s Participation at AcademyHealth’s 2018 Annual Research Meeting.
• Increased Access to Web-Based Information Improved Parents’ Attitudes Toward Childhood Vaccination.
• Highlights From AHRQ’s Patient Safety Network.
• Study Finds Medicare Advantage Enrollees Have Lower Health Risks Based on Their Prescription Drug Use.
• Featured Studies on the Nation's Health Systems.
• AHRQ Sets Aug. 8 Deadline for Nominations to National Advisory Council.
• New Research and Evidence From AHRQ.
• AHRQ in the Professional Literature.

New AHRQ Views Blog Posts: Highlighting AHRQ’s Participation at AcademyHealth’s 2018 Annual Research Meeting

AHRQ Director Gopal Khanna, M.B.A., and Chief Medical Officer David Meyers, M.D., authored blog posts that forecast AHRQ’s participation in AcademyHealth’s 2018 Annual Research Meeting held June 24–26 in Seattle. Director Khanna’s blog post outlined his vision for the future of health services research (HSR) while emphasizing his ambitions for an expanded dialogue among health systems leaders about broadening the use of available data. He introduced a session at the conference titled, "Moving Beyond p< 0.05: Making Health Services Research Relevant to the C-Suite." Dr. Meyers’ blog post suggested the time is right for the HSR community to explore potential new strategies to attack the opioid epidemic. He chaired a session titled, “Just Putting Opioids in the Title Won’t Get Your Projects Funded: Developing an HSR Agenda for Opioid Research.”

Increased Access to Web-Based Information Improved Parents’ Attitudes Toward Childhood Vaccination

Parents who were hesitant about vaccinating their children were more likely to change their minds when they were given access to Web-based information on childhood vaccinations, according to a new AHRQ-funded study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Nearly 1,100 parents participated between 2013 and 2016 in the randomized control trial consisting of three arms: parents with access to a website with vaccine information and interactive social media components; parents with access to a website with vaccine information; and parents who were provided usual care, meaning they did not receive the Web-based and social media messages. Based on parents’ survey responses during pregnancy and when their children reached 3–5 months and 12–15 months of age, the two Internet-based interventions were associated with significant reductions in parental concerns about vaccination risks compared with those receiving usual care. Access the abstract.

Highlights From AHRQ’s Patient Safety Network

AHRQ’s Patient Safety Network (PSNet) highlights journal articles, books and tools related to patient safety. Articles featured this week include:

• National quality program achieves improvements in safety culture and reduction in preventable harms in community hospitals.
• Association of opioid-related adverse drug events with clinical and cost outcomes among surgical patients in a large integrated health care delivery system.
• Transition to a new electronic health record and pediatric medication safety: lessons learned in pediatrics within a large academic health system.

Review additional new publications in PSNet’s current issue or access recent cases and commentaries in AHRQ’s WebM&M (Morbidity and Mortality Rounds on the Web).

Study Finds Medicare Advantage Enrollees Have Lower Health Risks Based on Their Prescription Drug Use

Medicare beneficiaries enrolled in Medicare Advantage health plans appear to have lower overall risks for health problems, as measured by differences in the use of prescription medications, than people enrolled in traditional Medicare, according to a recent AHRQ study. The findings may indicate that Medicare Advantage plans attract healthier patients, authors suggested. The article, in Health Services Research, analyzed drug use patterns for Medicare beneficiaries to determine health risk. It found that beneficiaries enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans in 2015 had 6.9 percent lower health risk than beneficiaries in traditional Medicare. Access the abstract. 

Featured Studies on the Nation's Health Systems

AHRQ's Comparative Health System Performance Initiative funds studies about how health care delivery systems promote evidence-based practices and patient-centered outcomes research in delivering care. Publications include:

• Early effects of Medicare’s bundled payment for care improvement program for lumbar fusion.
• Characteristics of interim publications of randomized clinical trials and comparison with final publications.
• Determinants of success in shared savings programs: an analysis of ACO and market characteristics.

Access the initiative's Compendium of U.S. Health Systems, 2016, the first publicly available database that gives researchers, policymakers and health care administrators a snapshot of the nation's health systems.

AHRQ Sets Aug. 8 Deadline for Nominations to National Advisory Council

AHRQ is seeking nominations for seven new members of its National Advisory Council. The panel, which represents health plans, providers, purchasers, consumers and researchers, advises the agency director and the Secretary of HHS on AHRQ activities and priorities for a national health services research agenda. Seven individuals will be selected to serve beginning in spring 2019. Members generally serve three-year terms. Among other attributes, nominees should be distinguished in the conduct of health care research and demonstration projects, the fields of health care quality research or health care improvement and the practice of medicine. The deadline for nominations is Aug. 8. Access the Federal Register notice for more information.

New Research and Evidence From AHRQ

• Sodium and Potassium Intake: Effects on Chronic Disease Outcomes and Risks.

AHRQ in the Professional Literature

Regional cost and experience, not size or hospital inclusion, helps predict ACO success. Schulz J, DeCamp M, Berkowitz SA. Medicine (Baltimore) 2017 Jun;96(24):e7209. Access the abstract on PubMed®.

Serum asymmetric and symmetric dimethylarginine and morbidity and mortality in hemodialysis patients. Shafi T, Hostetter TH, Meyer TW, et al. Am J Kidney Dis 2017 Jul;70(1):48-58. Epub 2017 Jan 12. Access the abstract on PubMed®.

Dissecting Leapfrog: how well do Leapfrog Safe Practices scores correlate with Hospital Compare ratings and penalties, and how much do they matter? Smith SN, Reichert HA, Ameling JM, et al. Med Care 2017 Jun;55(6):606-14. Access the abstract on PubMed®.

The use of social media in graduate medical education: a systematic review. Sterling M, Leung P, Wright D, et al. Acad Med 2017 Jul;92(7):1043-56. Access the abstract on PubMed®.

Cost-effectiveness of antihypertensive medication: exploring race and sex differences using data from the REasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke Study. Tajeu GS, Mennemeyer S, Menachemi N, et al. Med Care 2017 Jun;55(6):552-60. Access the abstract on PubMed®.

End-of-life care transition patterns of Medicare beneficiaries. Wang SY, Aldridge MD, Gross CP, et al. J Am Geriatr Soc 2017 Jul;65(7):1406-13. Epub 2017 Apr 3. Access the abstract on PubMed®.

The relationships among socio-demographics, perceived health, and happiness. Weech-Maldonado R, Miller MJ, Lord JC. Appl Res Qual Life 2017 Jun;12(2):289-302. Epub 2017 Mar 31. Access the abstract on PubMed®.

High compliance with scheduled nimodipine is associated with better outcome in aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage patients cotreated with heparin infusion. Wessell A, Kole MJ, Badjatia N, et al. Front Neurol 2017 Jun 9;8:268. eCollection 2017. Access the abstract on PubMed®.