Kaiser Permanente will make available on its’ web site a set of highly regarded treatment guidelines. According to this New York Times article, the move was part of a setttlement of a lawsuit by consumer organizations. It is viewed as empowering for patients as well as setting a high quality standard for comparing doctor performance. Could this be a trend towards open source treatment guidelines? Excerpt: ‘…doctors will still be free to deviate from them without penalty. But Kaiser patients � and the public � will now have access to information they can use to assess the treatment they receive and discuss it with their doctors. Patients will have to look up the information themselves on Kaiser’s Web site. Consumer advocates said the moves by Kaiser would push other managed care companies and medical groups to make similar disclosures regarding both treatments and doctors’ compensation…’ Thanks to Gary Kantor for this link and his thoughts.