Two U of Southern California centers sue L.A. Care to obtain quality-of-care records

Two University of Southern California centers filed a lawsuit April 19 against L.A. Care Health Plan to order the release of unredacted quality-of-care scorecards.

The Los Angeles-based USC Center for Health Journalism and the USC Center for Health Financing, Policy and Management are suing for the release of the scorecards under the California Public Records Act. 

The L.A. Care scorecards are made up of annual data on healthcare quality and patient satisfaction that ranks the performance of each provider in its plan. 

The USC centers claim they have sought the release of the scorecards through public record requests, but L.A. Care has refused to release unredacted scorecards that show how contracted providers perform.

L.A. Care has produced scorecards through the requests, but the payer redacted the names of provider groups.

The two centers say they plan to use the scorecards to build a platform where patients can choose their provider through data. The health journalism center also wants the records for journalistic accountability purposes, according to an April 19 press release.

The lawsuit is seeking an order stating that L.A. Care has broken state law and must turn over the unredacted requested records, a permanent injunction prohibiting L.A. Care from withholding unredacted scorecards, an award of attorney's fees incurred, an award of the costs of suit and other appropriate relief.

"L.A. Care impedes transparency and needed research as the records it produced deleted all the names of provider groups that serve its members," said Glenn Melnick, PhD, Blue Cross of California Chair in Healthcare Finance at USC. "Low-income families who receive their health insurance through Medi-Cal deserve to have access to this data so that they can make informed decisions about where to seek care. This information also should be available to the taxpayers who pay for this program so they can understand differences in performance."

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