The push to make hospitals and doctors more accountable for health care quality means more attention must be paid to the accuracy and reliability of measures used to evaluate caregivers, according to Johns Hopkins patient safety expert Peter Pronovost.

There is little consensus as to which measures are scientifically valid and accurate assessments of quality, and this risks misinforming patients who may make decisions based on metrics that poorly reflect the state of health care, Pronovost wrote in the April issue of Health Affairs.