Information intensive industries, such as health care, rely extensively on the ability to store, process, analyze, and use data. Although other information intensive industries have adopted information technology aggressively and reaped the benefits that result from usage, the health care...

Although quality information has been collected by governmental and private agencies for over three decades, public access to this information has typically been cumbersome. Recently, an initiative was launched in California in which hospitals can volunteer to provide a series of quality...