title: Using clinical registries to improve the quality of neurosurgical care.
abstract: Despite rising and unsustainable US health care costs, many stakeholders feel that the quality of medical services is limited and inconsistent. Value-based reforms are touted as the key to achieving health care system sustainability. Health care value is defined as quality delivered divided by cost incurred. Unfortunately, quality in health care is difficult to accurately define and methods to reliably assess and report health care quality are often lacking. Clinical registries have emerged as important mechanisms to define, measure, and promote health care quality. The purpose of this article is to describe the role of registries in neurosurgical quality improvement.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurological Surgery, Carolina Neurosurgery and Spine Associates, Carolinas Healthcare System Neuroscience Institute, 225 Baldwin Road, Charlotte, NC 28204, USA. Electronic address: asher@cnsa.com.
authors.forename: Anthony L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Asher
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurosurgery, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, 1211 Medical Center Drive, Nashville, TN 37232, USA.
authors.forename: Scott L
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Parker
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurological Surgery, University of California San Francisco, 505 Parnassus Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94143, USA.
authors.forename: John D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Rolston
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurological Surgery, Oregon Health & Science University, 3181 Southwest Sam Jackson Park Road, Portland, OR 97239, USA.
authors.forename: Nathan R
authors.initials: NR
authors.lastname: Selden
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurological Surgery, Carolina Neurosurgery and Spine Associates, Carolinas Healthcare System Neuroscience Institute, 225 Baldwin Road, Charlotte, NC 28204, USA.
authors.forename: Matthew J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: McGirt
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D019635:Neurosurgical Procedures / Q000592:standards*; D010043:Outcome and Process Assessment, Health Care / Q000592:standards*; D012042:Registries
keywords: Database; Patient outcomes; Quality improvement; Registry