Richard Shannon:    Before you decide to schedule an appointment with a new medical provider or a facility, what factors do you consider? While having a provider or facility be conveniently located is important, you may also want to consider the quality and safety of care you will receive. At UVA, we're beginning to post quality and safety data online, so you know how we are performing in a number of key areas.

Tracey Hoke:        We share our information for many reasons. One, we think it's incredibly important to be transparent about the services that we provide and the outcomes that we experience. We know that our patients have choice and we want them to have the best information possible to make the best choice. We also share our information very deliberately because of some of the shortcomings of the external benchmarking services. 

Tracey Hoke:        Everyone wants to know when they will be well again, everyone wants to know when they'll get back to work, everyone wants to know what they can expect in terms of complications. And I think if the relationship between the patient and the provider is open and honest, then those questions are easy to ask. And hopefully the provider will have data at their fingertips to share experience in volumes, and outcomes and expectations.

Richard Shannon:    We are also posting data that will allow you to see how care at UVA compares to what other hospitals provide.

Tracey Hoke:        UVA has gone above and beyond what's expected of an institution, in terms of creating real-time data that providers can act upon from an improvement standpoint, and in our willingness to share that data with our community and with our patients. It's changed the way we problem solve when we discover an opportunity, and it's made us a safer, better place to receive care.