2006 Priority Health Quality Award Winner

Spectrum Health PCP - Summit Park Center
What do practicing doctors think of health insurers setting standards and evaluating practices on that basis? At Spectrum Health PCP - Summit Park Center, Dr. Kenneth Fawcett believes that is fine since he considers some of Priority Health's standards for measuring key health performance measures to be good medicine.

Given the size of the practice's patient base, achieving the practice's high performance levels requires consistent management practices. Office Manager Rose Sherd says the staff's focus on quality in administration and giving doctor's access to timely information are key: "We use Priority Health's Patient Profiles and performance reports to identify areas for improvement. Making that information an everyday part of the way we do things makes all the difference."

"We don't just hope for good quality; we make it part of our practice, and the same standards are applied in all of the Spectrum PCP offices," says Fawcett. "It also involves communicating very closely with patients because we cannot do this alone. Patients who are non-compliant or not following through on their own care tend to get a little extra and emphatic attention."

Another way Spectrum Health PCP has reached its high levels of performance on Priority Health standards comes through a bit of what could be called "transparency". "The scores for our practices and each individual doctor are posted right there on the wall," says Fawcett. "It's nice to be up near the top, but not one of us wants to be at the other end of the scale."