ArticleBMJ quality & safety2016
Making comparative performance information more comprehensible: an experimental evaluation of the impact of formats on consumer understanding.
Article in BMJ quality & safety, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed.
- Optimising data visualisation formats for reporting medication-related care quality indicators: residential aged care staff preferences, interpretations and actions.BMJ open quality · 2026Article
- Evaluation of a new design solution for the visualisation of a risk-adjusted hospital performance comparison: results of an end user-centred mixed methods study.BMC medical informatics and decision making · 2026Article
- Information usefulness of public disclosure in Taiwan: Does it vary across specific diseases/conditions and contexts?PloS one · 2025Article
- Social Media, Digital Health Literacy, and Digital Ethics in the Light of Health Equity.Yearbook of medical informatics · 2022Article
- Testing the effects on information use by older versus younger women of modality and narration style in a hospital report card.Health expectations : an international journal of public participation in health care and health policy · 2022Article
- Use of a quantitative data report in a hypothetical decision scenario for health policymaking: a computer-assisted laboratory study.BMC medical informatics and decision making · 2021Article
- Best practices for data visualization: creating and evaluating a report for an evidence-based fall prevention program.Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA · 2020Article
- Feedback preferences of patients, professionals and health insurers in integrated head and neck cancer care.Health expectations : an international journal of public participation in health care and health policy · 2017Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
STUDY
objectivesWe aimed to investigate how different presentation formats influence comprehension and use of comparative performance information (CPI) among consumers.
methodsAn experimental between-subjects and within-subjects design with manipulations of CPI presentation formats. We enrolled both consumers with lower socioeconomic status (SES)/cognitive skills and consumers with higher SES/cognitive skills, recruited through an online access panel. Respondents received fictitious CPI and completed questions about interpretation and information use. Between subjects, we tested (1) displaying an overall performance score (yes/no); (2) displaying a small number of quality indicators (5 vs 9); and (3) displaying different types of evaluative symbols (star ratings, coloured dots and word icons vs numbers and bar graphs). Within subjects, we tested the effect of a reduced number of healthcare providers (5 vs 20). Data were analysed using descriptive analysis, analyses of variance and paired-sampled t tests.
resultsA total of 902 (43%) respondents participated. Displaying an overall performance score and the use of coloured dots and word icons particularly enhanced consumer understanding. Importantly, respondents provided with coloured dots most often correctly selected the top three healthcare providers (84.3%), compared with word icons (76.6% correct), star ratings (70.6% correct), numbers (62.0%) and bars (54.2%) when viewing performance scores of 20 providers. Furthermore, a reduced number of healthcare providers appeared to support consumers, for example, when provided with 20 providers, 69.5% correctly selected the top three, compared with 80.2% with five providers. DISCUSSION: Particular presentation formats enhanced consumer understanding of CPI, most importantly the use of overall performance scores, word icons and coloured dots, and a reduced number of providers displayed. Public report efforts should use these formats to maximise impact on consumers.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.