(NCQA: Washington) -- Five new measures of health care effectiveness were recently added to HEDIS, the most definitive set of health care quality measures in the United States.

Among the additions unveiled today by the National Committee for Quality Assurance is a set of measures that will allow purchasers and consumers to compare how much health plans spend on care delivery, in addition to how well they rate in clinical quality. Three new relative resource-use measures will enable standardized, risk-adjusted assessments of efficiency and effectiveness in the areas of care for patients with cardiovascular disease, hypertension and chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD).

NCQA also announced that it’s changing the underlying name of HEDIS to reflect its broader scope and utility. HEDIS now stands for “Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set.”

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