The National Supplementary Health Agency (ANS) released the results of the Qualification Program for Health Service Providers (Qualiss). With this, beneficiaries of health plans and other interested parties can consult, at the regulator's website, hospitals, clinics, laboratories and health professionals that meet important criteria related to quality of care.
Through the Diagnostic Imaging Accreditation Program (PADI), the Brazilian College of Radiology and Imaging Diagnostics (CBR) is one of the entities participating in Qualiss, with the role of accrediting/collaborating entity and manager of quality programs.
It is the first time that ANS provides complete information on all providers participating in the program, offering subsidies so that users can choose and compare services.
With the results, it is possible to consult the establishments that have an accreditation seal and a patient safety center, hospitals and clinics that develop projects to encourage the improvement of health care and qualifications obtained by health professionals, among other information. Each category of provider has specific and relevant qualification attributes for improving the quality of care.
To facilitate the search, ANS created a search system in which the user can find the provider by name, by type of establishment (hospital, day hospital, clinic or Support Service for Diagnosis and Therapy - SADT), State or municipality . In this first stage of disclosing the results of the program, the search engine includes around 1,400 accredited establishments, that is, those that have the maximum quality certification issued by institutions accrediting health services. Accreditation is a procedure for external verification of institutional resources and processes adopted by institutions and measures the quality of care through a set of previously established standards.
The user can also consult providers that have a Patient Safety Center registered with the National Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa) – approximately 1,490 establishments; hospitals reporting hospital readmission ratio rates to the ANS and day hospitals with unplanned return to operating room rate – indicators that measure the provider’s ongoing ability to help people recover as effectively as possible, often used as a parameter for quality of care; establishments that participate in ANS projects to induce care quality (Adequate Childbirth and Well Care of the Elderly); and health professionals who hold a degree (specialization, master's, doctorate or postdoctoral degree). In this category, information is provided on 35,110 professionals, including nurses, pharmacists, physiotherapists, speech therapists, nutritionists, physicians, dentists, psychologists and occupational therapists.
Health plan operators are required to disclose the qualification attributes of each provider that is part of their care network, and must periodically update the information contained in printed and electronic materials.
The participation of providers in the Qualiss program is voluntary. The qualification criteria also serve to compose the Quality Factor, a service remuneration model used to readjust contracts between operators and providers with a forecast of free negotiation between the parties, that is, when there is no index provided for in the contract and after negotiation, when there is no agreement. The list of establishments subject to the application of the Quality Factor is available in the contract area between operators and providers on the ANS website.
For the execution of the program, the ANS has the participation of several entities responsible for the elaboration of the criteria, collection and consolidation of data and monitoring of the providers.
Source: ANS