University professor Judith Hibbard has been nominated to serve on the National Advisory Council for Healthcare Research and Quality, a 21-member panel of professionals from around the country that focuses on improving the quality, safety, efficiency and effectiveness of health-care services in America.
The council consists of private-sector experts with varied perspectives and expertise about the health-care system, according to its Web site. They represent health-care plans, providers, purchasers, consumers and researchers.
Hibbard, a professor in the Department of Planning, Public Policy and Management since 1982, was nominated to serve on the council because of her research focusing on health-care quality and consumers’ role in improving health care.
“They wanted me on the council because of my expertise of the consumer role and it becoming a bigger solution to health-care problems,” Hibbard said.
Hibbard was nominated to serve on the council last spring and received her invitation to serve this winter. She will be on the council until 2007.
Council members serve three-year terms. They advise on and research issues from children’s health and quality assessments of medical care to seat belts and technology. The advisory council has three priorities it combines to achieve improvements in the American health-care structure: gaining new knowledge on priority health issues, finding new tools and talents, and transforming research into practice
Hibbard said she is currently working on a study examining the relationship between the information consumers receive and their health-care choices. As an example, she cites the impact that public reports on hospital care have on the consumers’ choices of hospitals.
The National Advisory Council is the major source of funding behind most health-care research in the United States. Hibbard is interested in the council ecause of its direct correlation to her research, she said.
“They set the direction for the kinds of health research of the country,” Hibbard said. “I have always been interested in what they do, but their work is very important now because of the very serious health-care issues that are facing the country.”
Hibbard said the three most pressing health-care problems in the country are a lack of quality of care that people receive, the cost of health care and the high rate of uninsured people.
“There is a widespread belief that the quality of health care is quite high in this country,” Hibbard said. “It’s not really true. People should investigate more when they are making decisions about health care.”

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