Abstract The quality report card is the tool to make the healthcare quality public for the health care providers. The major function of quality report cards is as a reference for patients to choose health care providers. The quality assurance program for primary care medicine under the global budget system indicates that issuing the quality report cards is able to ensure patients to have better healthcare quality. The quality report card not only discloses the healthcare quality information but also is an effective tool to measure healthcare quality to the providers. The Kao-Pin branch bureau of National Health Insurance (NHI) has implemented the demonstration program of quality report cards for hospitals and clinics since 2002, and published the hospitals' and clinics' basic information and patients' satisfaction in the internet as the reference for general population. This research team is conducting the project-"Feasibility of Implementation of Quality Report Cards for Primary Care Clinics", which was financially supported by Bureau of NHI in 2004, and will have the study results and conclusion in June 2005. The objectives of this study will evaluate the impact of implementation of quality report cards for primary care clinics on physicians' practice patterns and on patients' choices for medical care as well as physicians' opinions and patients' satisfaction for quality report cards. Then this study will improve the contents of quality report cards and the mechanism of publishing and dissemination based on the survey. Finally, this study will like to propose the plan of implementation of quality report cards for primary care clinics for the Bureau of NHI. In order to understand the impact of quality report cards on clinic physicians' practice and patients' behaviors when they seeking medical treatment, questionnaires will be used to interview primary care physicians and general population. For primary care clinic, the study population will be primary care physicians whose clinic is located at the areas managed by Kao-Pin branch bureau of NHI. Questionnaires will be sent to these physicians and the returned questionnaires will be expected to be 250. People aged more than 20 years old and living in the areas managed by Kao-Pin branches of BNHI will be interviewed by phone and a total of 800 samples will be collected. Multiple regression analysis will be applied to analyze the affecting factors of primary care physicians' satisfaction as well as on patients' satisfaction with the implementation of quality report cards. In addition, logistic regression analysis will be used to explore the factors which will influence patients' behavior when they seek medical treatment, and also to examine the factors influencing primary care physicians to support quality report cards. Moreover, this research will like to understand the opinions of primary care physicians about the implementation of quality report cards. According to the investigation and the first-year study results conducted by this research team, the expert panel will be hold to discuss the appropriation of the contents of quality report cards. Finally, this research will propose the suitable plan and feasible alternatives of implementing the quality report cards for clinics in Taiwan.
