The Leapfrog Group and URAC, the national accreditation body, are accepting applications for their joint Hospital Website Transparency Awards.

 

This awards program, now in its second year, identifies hospital websites that display quality measures that are useful and easy to understand for patients, payers and the general public. All hospitals that complete a 2013 Leapfrog Hospital Survey are eligible.

 

Websites will be evaluated in five category areas: transparency/reporting, design, credibility, literacy and connectivity. The highest achieving hospitals in these five categories will receive the Hospital Website Transparency Award. 

 

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Applicant hospitals will also have an opportunity to highlight any innovations within the application categories, as well as website innovations that may fall outside of the identified topic areas. These submissions will be evaluated by a panel of judges, and up to three hospitals may receive the Hospital Website Transparency Award with Distinction based on their innovative practices and their overall application score.

 

The awards criteria have been developed in accordance with the National Quality Forum’s guidelines for consumer-focused, Internet-based public reporting of health performance data, as well as the Model Public Report Elements prepared for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), officials say.

 

Applications will be accepted through Sept. 20, 2013. More information about the URAC and The Leapfrog Group Hospital Website Transparency Awards program can be found here. 

 

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