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Healthcare quality is not only about how expertly doctors treat injuries and manage illnesses. It also is about the personal experiences of patients, beginning with the first phone call to make an appointment and everything that follows.
Measuring and reporting on patient experience has been MHQP’s core work for most of our history. Our signature program is the only statewide patient experience survey of primary care patients in Massachusetts, which asks patients about their experiences with their own doctor or their child’s doctor, as well as other staff in those doctors’ offices, across nine performance categories. In 2019, we also added to our portfolio a patient experience survey of Medicaid recipients in partnership with MassHealth.
Here is a list of the posts on this site related to MHQP’s patient experience activities:
MHQP Announces Winners of 2023 Patient Experience Awards
(February 2024)
MHQP is pleased to announce the winners of the 2023 “MHQP Patient Experience Awards.” MHQP introduced this award program in 2018 as a way to recognize the primary care practices that perform highest on our annual Commercial Patient Experience Survey, the only statewide survey of patient experience in primary care in Massachusetts.
In 2023, MHQP received more than
MHQP’s Statewide Survey Shows Patients Continue to Experience Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Massachusetts
(February 2024)
Black and Asian patients reported worse experiences in primary care than White patients across many categories in MHQP’s 2023 statewide Patient Experience Survey, the results of which were released today. The same was true of Hispanic/Latino patients when compared to non-Hispanic/Latino patients.
Evidence has shown that positive patient experiences are associated with better health
Patient Experience Scores for Adults Improve Since Before the Pandemic, Except in One Key Area: Access
MHQP’s statewide Patient Experience Survey confirms that patients are struggling to access primary care.
Scores for pediatric care declined in other critical areas as well.
(February 2024)
The results of MHQP’s annual statewide Patient Experience Survey, which were released today, offer an important indication of how patients’ experiences have shifted during and after the pandemic.
First
MHQP Surveying MassHealth Members About Their Patient Experiences of Care
(May 2023)
MHQP is pleased to announce that we have again been selected by the Executive Office of Health and Human Services (EOHHS) for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts as its vendor to survey members of MassHealth, the state’s Medicaid program, about their experiences of care. MHQP completed a five-year contract for
MHQP Receives BCBSMA Foundation Grant to Explore Asian Patient Experiences
(March 2023)
Through a Special Initiatives grant from the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation (BCBSMAF), MHQP has launched a new project designed to help better understand why Asian patients report worse experiences with primary care than other racial populations. A deeper understanding requires a more nuanced consideration of the
Winners of MHQP’s 2022 Patient Experience Awards Provide Best-In-Class Experiences Despite Growing Challenges for Primary Care
(February 2023)
Primary care practices are facing unprecedented challenges in the wake of the pandemic due to staffing shortages, inadequate reimbursement policies, changing patterns of well visits, practice consolidation, increased competition from new sources, and many other factors. Despite these challenges, the winners of the 2022 MHQP “Patient Experience Awards” found a
Black, Hispanic and Asian Patients Report Worse Patient Experiences than White Patients in Massachusetts
(February 2023)
MHQP Convening Stakeholders to Explore Drivers of These Disparities and How to Reduce Them
Black, Asian and Hispanic patients report worse experiences than White, non-Hispanic patients in Massachusetts. This is the key finding of an analysis of data collected in MHQP’s annual statewide Patient Experience Survey of commercially-insured patients,
MHQP Welcomes Partners on Statewide Initiative to Measure Disparities in Patient Experience
(November 2022)
MHQP is excited to launch an initiative to measure racial and ethnic disparities in patient experiences across Massachusetts by utilizing the same instrument and methodology we have used to measure patient experience in the state since 2006.
Our aim is to broker consistency in health equity measurement throughout the state
The Need to Measure Patient Experience of Oral Health Care: A Call to Action
(November 2022)
MHQP’s Amy Stern, Andrew D’Amour, Jim Courtemanche, and Barbra Rabson have co-authored an important article in collaboration with Nadeem Karimbux, Dean of the Tufts School of Dental Medicine, and Dr. Mike John, Associate Professor at the Minnesota School of Dentistry. The article, which was recently published in
Telehealth Satisfaction: Up for Clinicians, Down for Patients
(October 2022)
Two-and-a-half years since the beginning of the pandemic, what have we learned about telehealth and how can we make it better for everyone? MHQP has endeavored to answer this question throughout the pandemic in multiple ways.
First, we launched “Together for Better Telehealth” in the summer of 2020, a
Stepping Out of Silos to Tackle Disparities
(September 2022)
Nearly 30 years ago, a Boston Globe Spotlight article highlighted “the worst hospitals” in Massachusetts based on high mortality rates. In the wake of that article, well before the measurement of healthcare quality was widely practiced and accepted, a forward-thinking group of healthcare, business and community leaders
Evaluating Patient Experiences of Primary Care by Visit Mode and Visit Reason During the Pandemic
(September 2022)
MHQP’s Jim Courtemanche, Nathalie McIntosh, Raji Rajan and Barbra Rabson co-authored, along with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts’ Mark Friedberg, an important study investigating adult patient experiences of, and satisfaction with, in-person, video, and telephone visits in primary care during the COVID-19
Tackling Inequities in Pain Assessment and Management
(August 2022)
Historically marginalized communities are systematically undertreated for pain, and this issue disproportionately impacts Black women. While this fact is well established by research (1), we know very little about the specific barriers that Black women experience when they seek pain care.
To help identify opportunities to close this research gap
MHQP’s Rabson and McIntosh Co-Author Award-Winning Study on Telehealth
(August 2022)
MHQP’s Barbra Rabson and Nathalie McIntosh are co-authors of an important article which has earned the Telehealth and Medicine Today journal 2021 Annual Editors Best Article Award, exhibiting the most views, downloads, and citations.
The independent academic healthcare publisher, Partners in Digital Health (PDH), published findings from the three-part
It’s Time to Better Understand and Address Disparities in Patient Experiences
By Barbra G. Rabson
(July 2022)
The pandemic has shown us that we are not doing enough to equally promote health for people of all races and ethnicities. Given that there are well-known and researched disparities across all aspects of care, it may not surprise you to learn that Black, Hispanic and Asian
MHQP Confirms Significant Drop-Off in Key Preventive Care Measures During the Pandemic
(May 2022) Alarming declines in cancer screening procedures, routine tests for patients with diabetes, and childhood immunizations recorded
Data released today by MHQP confirm what many providers and policymakers feared – that preventive care declined during the pandemic, especially for procedures that required patients to visit a clinical setting in person.
Community-Wide Care Coordination Program Better Supports Kids with Behavioral Health Needs
(March 2022) MHQP Patient Experience Award Winner, MACONY Pediatrics, Leads the Effort.
It started back in 2015, well before anyone at MACONY Pediatrics had ever heard of the MHQP Patient Experience Awards. Healthcare and social service providers in and around Great Barrington, Massachusetts, were seeing a steady rise in behavioral health issues among
MHQP Announces Winners of 2021 Patient Experience Awards
(January 2022)
MHQP has announced the winners of the 2021 “MHQP Patient Experience Awards.” MHQP introduced this award program in 2018 as a way to recognize the primary care practices that perform highest on its annual Commercial Patient Experience Survey, the only statewide survey of patient experience in primary care in Massachusetts.
The
MHQP Using Artificial Intelligence to Make Patient Comments More Actionable
(December 2021)
Patient narratives – hearing feedback directly from patients in their own words – is perhaps the most powerful tool for healthcare practices to improve patient experiences. Qualitative feedback can provide personal insights and perspectives that no quantitative data can offer.
Recognizing this fact, MHQP took action a few years ago to
Patients Really Like Telehealth. Let’s Resolve to Make It Work.
By Barbra G. Rabson
(January 2022)
At the beginning of the pandemic, I penned a post I called “Now Is the Time to Get Telehealth Right” in which I suggested that something good might emerge from what I called our “grand telehealth experiment.” Well, my friends, the pandemic may not be over