Below is an illustration of the kind of information that CMS is working with partners to develop and make available to help patients make decisions about their care. The volume and cost data posted on June 1 and existing data from www.HospitalCompare.hhs.gov are pieces of this information. New information, such as patient satisfaction and hospital surgical infection data, will be added to the Hospital Compare site as it becomes available. Other data from a variety of other sources could be integrated into such consumer tools as they are developed by others.

The data released on volume and payments, coupled with other existing information, support the creation of tools that could allow users to input the treatments they are looking for - such as knee replacements or diabetes care and the location (by county, for example) of providers that offer those treatments. Tools are already being developed to provide this kind of support. In the future, with continued collaborative work to promote transparency, they will be expanded to provide more comprehensive information on quality and cost.

As displayed below, such a tool could show results sorted by the name and location of the provider (location), the provider's quality of care, and the cost of the services overall and to the patient (using insurance information). Users would be able to "drill down" to get more information on particular aspects of quality (such as complication rates or patient satisfaction) and of costs (such as surgeon or rehabilitation costs). Users could also customize the presentation of this information to reflect their preferences.