The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality has released its 2006 "National Healthcare Quality Report" and "National Healthcare Disparities Report," which together track trends in health-care quality and access across many racial and ethnic minority groups and socioeconomic groups. The quality report notes that the greatest recent quality improvements have occurred in hospitals, particularly related to improved treatment for heart attack and pneumonia patients. However, the report states that the pace of change among the 40 core quality measures identified by AHRQ is slow overall, and there is a high degree of variation among states.

According to the disparities report, African Americans receive poorer care than whites for 73 percent of the core measures selected by AHRQ, while Hispanics received poorer care for 77 percent of the measures. Low income patients received lower quality care than people of high income. For more information, please visit http://www.ahrq.gov/qual/nhqr06/nhqr06.htm and http://www.ahrq.gov/qual/nhdr06/nhdr06.htm.