National Healthcare Quality and Disparities Report
Latest available findings on quality of and access to health care
Data
- Data Infographics
- Data Visualizations
- Data Tools
- Data Innovations
- All-Payer Claims Database
- Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project (HCUP)
- Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS)
- AHRQ Quality Indicator Tools for Data Analytics
- State Snapshots
- United States Health Information Knowledgebase (USHIK)
- Data Sources Available from AHRQ
Tools
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) offers practical, research-based tools and other resources to help a variety of health care organizations, providers, and others make care safer in all health care settings.
Community Connections Obesity Referral Toolkit
This toolkit helps primary care practices determine and evaluate what accessible and affordable resources exist in their community for patients struggling with obesity and/or prediabetes; establish a productive relationship with community partners and develop a bidirectional referral process that integrates directly into existing patient flow; and enhance engagement strategies with patients.
Date Published: March 2014 Setting of Care: Ambulatory Care
Comprehensive Unit-Based Safety Program (CUSP) Toolkit
Created for clinicians by clinicians, this toolkit includes training tools to make care safer by improving the foundation of how physicians, nurses, and other clinical team members work together and builds the capacity to address safety issues by combining clinical best practices and the science of safety. Additional AHRQ toolkits build on the CUSP model to address problems such as central line-associated bloodstream infections (CLABSI), catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTI), infections associated with ventilators, surgical complications, and more.
Date Published: December 2012 Setting of Care: Hospital, Outpatient Surgery
Emergency Severity Index (ESI): A Triage Tool for Emergency Department Care
The ESI is a five-level emergency department triage algorithm that helps hospital emergency department staff rapidly identify patients in need of immediate attention and better identify patients who could safely and more efficiently be seen in a fast-track or urgent care center rather than the main emergency department.
Date Published: September 2012 Setting of Care: Hospital
ePROs in Clinical Care
The ePROs in Clinical Care is a toolkit funded by AHRQ’s Digital Healthcare Research Program, designed to help healthcare systems govern, integrate, and report electronic patient-reported outcomes (ePROs) data for clinical care delivery. The ePROs in Clinical Care toolkit provides evidence-based guidelines and strategies for the use of PROs that are collected electronically, rather than through traditional pen-and-paper methods. The toolkit is organized around three core topic areas where changes may be needed across the health systems: Governance, Integration, and Reporting. The resource is intended to support the growing use of ePROs in clinical care. The toolkit was developed through a grant awarded to the University of Washington.
Date Published: July 2020 Setting of Care: Hospital
EvidenceNOW Tools for Change
This resource offers a searchable collection of over 100 tools to help primary care practices make changes to implement evidence, as well as tools for practice facilitators to assist them.
Date Published: December 2018 Setting of Care: Ambulatory Care
Guide to Integrate Patient-Generated Digital Health Data into Electronic Health Records in Ambulatory Care Settings
This guide was created to support ambulatory care settings of all types in the design and implementation of successful patient-generated health data (PGHD) programs. The guide is organized into six folios that help healthcare providers and vendors navigate the many steps from design, to launch, to maintenance of a successful, sustainable PGHD program.
Date Published: December 2021 Setting of Care: Ambulatory Care
Guide to Patient and Family Engagement in Hospital Quality and Safety
This guide helps hospitals work as partners with patients and families to improve quality and safety by encouraging patients and family members to participate as advisors. The tools help to promote better communication, implement nurse bedside change-of-shift reports, and engage patients and families in discharge planning throughout the hospital stay.
Date Published: September 2012 Setting of Care: Hospital
Hospital Guide to Reducing Medicaid Readmissions
This guide presents strategies to design and deliver transitional care to adult Medicaid patients to help reduce hospital readmissions. It provides tools and guidance on who should use them and how.
Date Published: August 2014 Setting of Care: Hospital
Improving Medication Safety in High-Risk Medicare Beneficiaries Toolkit
This toolkit provides clinicians and researchers instruments, forms and tools for the ambulatory-based medication therapy management model, which focuses on medication reconciliation and assessment and resolution of drug-related problems in the Medicare population.
Date Published: July 2012 Setting of Care: Ambulatory Care, Hospital
Improving Patient Flow and Reducing Hospital Emergency Department Crowding: A Guide for Hospitals
This guide presents step-by-step instructions for planning and implementing patient flow improvement strategies to ease emergency department crowding.
Date Published: September 2012 Setting of Care: Hospital