Measuring Hospital Care from the Patients' Perspective: An Overview of the CAHPS® Hospital Survey Development Process

OBJECTIVE: To describe the developmental process for the CAHPS Hospital Survey. STUDY DESIGN: A pilot was conducted in three states with 19,720 hospital discharges. METHODS OF ANALYSIS: A rigorous, multi-step process was used to develop the CAHPS Hospital Survey. It included a public call for measures, multiple Federal Register notices soliciting public input, a review of the relevant literature, meetings with hospitals, consumers and survey vendors, cognitive interviews with consumer, a large-scale pilot test in three states and consumer testing and numerous small-scale field tests. FINDINGS: The current version of the CAHPS Hospital Survey has survey items in seven domains, two overall ratings of the hospital and five items used for adjusting for the mix of patients across hospitals and for analytical purposes. CONCLUSIONS: The CAHPS Hospital Survey is a core set of questions that can be administered as a stand-alone questionnaire or combined with a broader set of hospital specific items.