For over 20 years, The Dartmouth Atlas has documented the geographic variation in healthcare that patients in the U.S. receive.

If you live in the southern tip of Texas and you develop back pain, there's a certain likelihood that you'll have surgery to treat it. But if you lived in northern Idaho, you'd be 6 times more likely to have surgery, all else being equal.(1)

This phenomenon, in which patients receive different care depending on where they’re from, is called practice pattern variation.  And it isn’t limited to treating back pain, or even surgical decisions. There is also wide variation in treatment for chronic conditions, as well as in testing and diagnostics.

Dr. John Wennberg and his colleagues at The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice have spent over 40 years documenting practice pattern variation, and have concluded that if unwarranted variation in the healthcare system were eliminated, the quality of care would go up and healthcare costs would go down by as much as 30%. Dr. Wennberg's research can be found in his recently published book, Tracking Medicine.

Health Dialog’s mission is to reduce unwarranted variation.  We do it by empowering patients with information about treatment choices.  Our unwarranted variation analytics give us a unique perspective on who is at risk for overtreatment – or undertreatment – based on their location.

(1) http://www.dartmouthatlas.org/data/download.shtm,2005