Background

Since its inception in 2002, the Wisconsin Collaborative for Healthcare Quality (WCHQ) has sought to improve healthcare quality in the state of Wisconsin through the development and public reporting of a comprehensive range of healthcare performance measures. Its first public report of evidence-based measures for inpatient and outpatient care, issued in October 2003, largely reproduced data available through CMS and other sources. Since then, the creativity and success of WCHQ's approaches to the daunting challenges of healthcare data collection, audit and validation, analysis, and reporting have been recognized nationally. Today, WCHQ's Performance and Progress Report is a rich source of information about healthcare quality and is refreshed regularly with new results and measures.