What is the goal of the pay-for-performance strategy in healthcare?

The pay-for-performance strategy in healthcare aims to incentivize providers by rewarding them for achieving specific quality and efficiency objectives. This approach emphasizes the importance of delivering high-quality care and improving patient outcomes rather than merely increasing the number of services provided. By linking financial rewards to measurable performance indicators, such as patient satisfaction, clinical outcomes, and adherence to best practices, this strategy encourages healthcare providers to focus on the overall quality of care they deliver. As a result, it aligns the interests of providers with those of patients, promoting better health outcomes and more effective use of healthcare resources.

The other options do not encapsulate the primary aim of the pay-for-performance strategy. For instance, the notion of increasing patient volume focuses on quantity rather than the quality of care. Reducing healthcare costs for patients may be a consequence of improved efficiency but is not the direct focus of the pay-for-performance model. Standardizing treatment protocols, while beneficial in certain contexts, is not the primary goal of the pay-for-performance approach, which is centered on rewarding providers for their performance metrics rather than simply adhering to set protocols.