Paying for Quality: Experience from the UK and Inspiration for China's Healthcare Payment System

Abstract

China is facing both the rapid growth of medical expenses and challenge of quality care. Paying for quality for healthcare providers used by international healthcare systems has proven to be effective in solving the problems. We systematically reviewed the UK Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF) , a typical case of paying for quality, with a description of its content, effectiveness of implementation and future prospect, which may have implications for China's healthcare payment system. We analyzed the applicable feasibility of paying for quality in China's healthcare payment system using the policy analytical framework in accordance with China's political, technological, economic and administrative conditions, and suggested that paying for quality may have a good application prospect but with limitations for fully implementation. In the future, it could be first used as a payment method for chronic disease outpatient care or Chinese medicine services as a pilot program, and integrated into the multiple composite medical insurance payment system, and applied to other fields exploratorily.

Keywords

• paying for quality|quality and outcome framework|policy scheme analysis framework|health care reform|united kingdom