i urge albertans to support this bill for the following reasons:
for the $20 billion or so that we spend on health care in alberta, we have precious little easily accessed reporting on how well our health system, and the entities that comprise it, perform. setting and reporting on standards make good sense. no one would run a $20-billion business without measurement and reporting as to how well it meets its goals.
quality health care goes beyond access, but access to care is foundational to all other measures of quality (effectiveness, acceptability, appropriateness, safety and efficiency). you can’t have “acceptable care” or “safe care” unless you can first access care. while all the measures of quality are important, ensuring access to care is critical, explaining the rationale for this legislation’s focus.
the hqca is a jewel in our health-care system, but one that is underused and underfunded. it is also burdened by its current reporting relationship to the minister of health. having greater independence, reporting directly to the public and the alberta legislature, like the auditor general, is a key feature of bill 201, one i strongly support, as the hqca’s reporting in the past has been hampered and delayed by the whims of the minister or ministry of health.