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CMS-1403-FC
informed decision-making by consumers and purchasers. Some
commenters also expressed support for making specific types
of information public about eligible professionals.
Examples of information that commenters would like to see
made public include, but are not limited to, board
certification status and certification maintenance status,
adding hospital medicine to the list of specialties
contained in the Physician and Other Healthcare
Professional Directory, CAHPS patient survey data, an
indicator of whether an eligible professional participates
in a clinical data registry, and the numerators and
denominators for any measure rates that are publicly
reported.
Response: We are pleased to have the commenters’
support for our broader goal to make information on
physician performance publicly available. We agree that
such information may be relevant and useful to a broad
audience. Physicians and other eligible professionals can
use information about their own performance and the
performance of their peers to improve the quality of the
care they deliver. Medicare beneficiaries and other
consumers can use such information to inform their
decision-making when it comes to selecting their health
care providers. We note, however, that much of the
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