Please note that our team is currently reviewing the Health Service Quality Report Card tool. We are committed to enhancing its methodology and structure to ensure its accuracy and usability. Stay tuned for updates!
The New Brunswick Health Service Quality Report Card contains indicators of performance organized by sectors of care/services and by dimensions of quality.
The overall performance index grade is a composite of the average of individual grades for a selected group of measures. The individual grade measures are assigned based on New Brunswick's position in relation to the highest and lowest value achieved among the 10 Canadian provinces. Zone grades are calculated similarly, assigned based on each zone's position in relation to the highest and lowest value achieved among the 7 New Brunswick health zones.
For the data used to calculate the grades, download our Excel.
2021 Report Card
What are dimensions and sectors?
Dimensions:
- Accessibility: The ability of patients/clients to obtain care/service at the right place and the right time, based on respective needs, in the official language of their choice
- Appropriateness: Care/service provided is relevant to the patients’/clients' needs and based on established standards
- Effectiveness: The care/service, intervention or action achieves the desired results
- Efficiency: Achieving the desired results with the most cost-effective use of resources
- Safety: Potential risks of an intervention or the environment are avoided or minimized
Sectors:
- Primary health: The care/service a person receives upon first contact with the health system, before referral elsewhere within the system. It focuses on health promotion, illness and injury prevention, and the diagnosis and treatment of illness
- Acute care: The care/service provided in a hospital or a psychiatric facility
- Supportive/specialty: The care/service received in the community or as an out-patient to prevent, control, or relieve complications and/or side effects and to improve the citizen's comfort and quality of life
Methodology
The indicators chosen are based on outcome and system level type indicators. These types of indicators are often strategic in nature and facilitate priority planning from a systems perspective. Most of the indicators are based on high-cost or high-volume program and service areas.
The indicators that the NBHC identified for use are those being collected from New Brunswick administrative databases and/or are available in the public domain: Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI), National Physician Survey, Statistics Canada and New Brunswick Department of Health.
The set of indicators meet our acceptable criteria list :
- Relevant to the concerns of our target audiences
- Easy to understand
- Reliable and valid
- Timely
- Easy to obtain and periodically updated
- Obtainable through an open, transparent and inclusive consultative review process
- Contribute to a coherent and comprehensive view of health system performance in New Brunswick
The method for public reporting is the use of a report card which contained performance index grades.
For individual indicator grades
The letter grading for an indicator is calculated by first identifying the best and worst values among provinces. Because we have seven grades, this range is then divided by 7 to create cut-off points for grade separations. The grades are then assigned to each of the ranges from A+ to F. The grade A+ corresponds to the highest achievable interval and the grade F to the lowest.
Example:
Step 1 - Calculate range: The best value among provinces (84%) minus the worst value (78%) = 6
Step 2 - Calculate intervals: 6 divided by 7 possible grades = .86
Step 3 - Assign N.B.'s value (e.g. 80.5%) to a grade:
| A+ | A | B | C | D | E | F |
| 84.0 to 83.2 | 83.1 to 82.4 | 82.3 to 81.5 | 81.4 to 80.7 | 80.6 to 79.8 | 79.7 to 79.0 | 78.9 to 78.0 |
For overall grades
To calculate the overall performance grade, individual indicator grades are assigned scores from 1 (for an A+) to 7 (for an F) and these scores are averaged.
Example:
Step 1 - List indicator grades: C, A+, B, B, D, D, E, F, C, A+, A+, D, D, A+, A+, B, A+, C, B
Step 2 - Calculate average: (4+1+3+3+5+5+6+7+4+1+1+5+5+1+1+3+1+4+3) / 19 = 3.3
Step 3 - Round N.B.'s score (e.g. 3.3 = 3) and assign it to a grade:
| A+ | A | B | C | D | E | F |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |