The recent HHS announcement to reorganize federal health research and service agencies could have cascading negative effects for the U.S. health system. Among the agencies facing threat of elimination or significant reduction in staff and scope, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) plays an especially valuable role: producing evidence on how to improve health system impact and efficiency, while protecting patient safety. Any reforms must preserve AHRQ's statutorily mandated and unique focus on health services research, especially considering that the agency helps health system decision-makers stay informed of patterns and trends, nimble in anticipating future needs, and responsive in providing quality care for patients across the U.S.
A critical source of funding for HSR
Despite its relatively modest budget, AHRQ plays an important role in the health services research (HSR) landscape: one that complements the work of other prominent funders like the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Historically seen as the largest public funder of biomedical research, the NIH has made significant investments in examining clinical conditions and developing targeted treatments. Without AHRQ, however, those biomedical research results may have limited real-world impact. Once science-backed treatments are developed, AHRQ-funded research shows us how to create the ideal conditions for delivering these treatments to real patients in real settings. This supports a higher-performing health system: reducing wasteful spending and increasing the return on research investments by informing efficient, effective implementation of new solutions.
Drives evidence into action
Rather than reduce health challenges to an academic exercise or a controlled lab experiment, AHRQ answers questions with real-world impact. Focused on practical application and implementation, it explores how to improve the quality, safety, efficiency, and accessibility of health care and how we provide it. How can we use AI to reduce provider errors and improve patient safety? How can we enhance care coordination to lower costs? How can we minimize wait times to improve patient satisfaction? AHRQ helps answer questions like these by funding, for example:
- Team Strategies and Tools to Enhance Performance for Patient Safety (TeamSTEPPS). This training system improves communication, coordination, and teamwork between different providers on a patient’s care teams.
- The Patient Safety Network (PSNet). This comprehensive resource compiles news and tools widely used by hospitals, clinics, and health systems to guide decisions regarding patient safety and quality.
Advances research methods and data infrastructure
As the federal home for patient safety research (an area relatively de-emphasized by other funders in this ecosystem), AHRQ advances methods for improved health care delivery. It pushes the field forward, toward innovation in health research by hosting and maintaining some of our country’s most comprehensive and valuable health data resources.
- Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) Surveys make it possible to collect standardized information about the health care experiences of patients across the U.S.
- The largest collection of longitudinal data on national hospital use, Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project (HCUP) supports research on health care costs, utilization, and outcomes.
- The Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS) provides nationally representative data on the cost and use of health care and insurance coverage.
AHRQ helps make these resources useful and usable by advancing learning health systems and strengthening the health data infrastructure. AHRQ-supported practice-based research networks (PBRNs) limit the “distance” between health research and practice so that new insights get immediately incorporated into real-world care. This requires enhanced data interoperability and IT integration, which supports broader system-level improvements: providing a model for coordinated data sharing, rapid research translation, and ongoing innovation or iteration based on what works.
Shapes health policy and system reform
Through data-driven research and analysis, AHRQ also shapes national and state-level health policies. As a non-regulatory agency, AHRQ plays the neutral role of enabling (rather than mandating) health system improvements. AHRQ-supported evidence about “what works” helps inform the design of payment reforms, value-based purchasing programs, and alternative care delivery models (e.g., accountable care organizations, patient-centered medical homes). AHRQ also contributes to quality measurement frameworks underpinning regulatory and accreditation systems that support ongoing monitoring and maintenance across our health system.
In these and other ways, AHRQ not only funds research but serves as a vital catalyst for health system transformation, innovation, and improvement at all levels. By evaluating effectiveness, improving efficiency, and enhancing innovation – AHRQ helps our health system keep pace in ways that honor patients’ needs, improve their health, and prepare us to face the future of the field.
Read our previous blog on the five reasons why AHRQ is essential to high value, high quality health care and must be protected here.
You can take action to protect AHRQ. See our “Stand with AHRQ toolkit” which offers resources for contacting your representatives, messaging guidance, example social media posts, and more here.