Performance Measurement to Demonstrate Value.

Anesthesiologists are obligated to demonstrate the value of the care they provide. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has multiple performance-based payment programs to drive high-value care and motivate integrated care for surgical patients and hospitalized patients. These programs rely on diverse arrays of performance measures and complex reporting rules. Among all specialties, anesthesiology has tremendous potential to effect wide-ranging change on diverse measures. Performance measures deserve scrutiny by anesthesiologists as tools to improve care, the means by which payment is determined, and as a means to demonstrate the value of care to surgeons, hospitals, and patients.