Community Academic Profiles - Faculty & Researchers

High quality care and ethical pay-for-performance: a Society of General Internal Medicine policy analysis.
Wharam JF, Paasche-Orlow MK, Farber NJ, Sinsky C, Rucker L, Rask KJ, Figaro MK, Braddock C, Barry MJ, Sulmasy DP. J Gen Intern Med. 2009; 24 (7): 854-9
BACKGROUND: Pay-for-performance is proliferating, yet its impact on key stakeholders remains uncertain. OBJECTIVE: The Society of General Internal Medicine systematically evaluated ethical issues raised by performance-based physician compensation. RESULTS: We conclude that current arrangements are based on fundamentally acceptable ethical principles, but are guided by an incomplete understanding of health-care quality. Furthermore, their implementation without evidence of safety and efficacy is ethically precarious because of potential risks to stakeholders, especially vulnerable patients. CONCLUSION: We propose four major strategies to transition from risky pay-for-performance systems to ethical performance-based physician compensation and high quality care. These include implementing safeguards within current pay-for-performance systems, reaching consensus regarding the obligations of key stakeholders in improving health-care quality, developing valid and comprehensive measures of health-care quality, and utilizing a cautious evaluative approach in creating the next generation of compensation systems that reward genuine quality.

PubMedID: 19294471

Clarence H Braddock III, MD, MPH