About the Authors

Sabine Ludt

sabine.ludt@med.uni-heidelberg.de

Affiliation Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany

Elisabeth Urban

Affiliation Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany

Jörg Eckardt

Affiliation AQUA-Institute for Applied Quality Improvement and Research in Healthcare, Goettingen, Germany

Stefanie Wache

Affiliation AQUA-Institute for Applied Quality Improvement and Research in Healthcare, Goettingen, Germany

Björn Broge

Affiliation AQUA-Institute for Applied Quality Improvement and Research in Healthcare, Goettingen, Germany

Petra Kaufmann-Kolle

Affiliation AQUA-Institute for Applied Quality Improvement and Research in Healthcare, Goettingen, Germany

Günther Heller

Affiliation AQUA-Institute for Applied Quality Improvement and Research in Healthcare, Goettingen, Germany

Antje Miksch

Affiliation Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany

Katharina Glassen

Affiliation Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany

Katja Hermann

Affiliation Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany

Regine Bölter

Affiliation Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany

Dominik Ose

Affiliation Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany

Stephen M. Campbell

Affiliations Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany, Institute for Population Health – Centre for Primary Care, University of Manchester, Manchester, United Kingdom

Michel Wensing

Affiliations Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany, Scientific Institute for Quality of Healthcare, Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

Joachim Szecsenyi

Affiliations Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University of Heidelberg Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany, AQUA-Institute for Applied Quality Improvement and Research in Healthcare, Goettingen, Germany

Competing Interests

JS is a director and shareholder of the AQUA-institute which is responsible for the development of the SQG program by contract with the Federal Joint Committee. SL, EU, AM, KG, KH, RB, and DO are employees of the department of General Practice and Health Services Research at the University Hospital of Heidelberg. The department is a contract partner of the AQUA-Institute. SMC is an expert in the field of indicator development and has a contract with the department of General Practice and Health Services Research. BB, JE, SW, PK-K and GH are employees and MW's institute has a contract with the AQUAinstitute. This does not alter the authors' adherence to all the PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: SL JS JE BB. Performed the experiments: SL EU SW JE AM KG KH RB DO. Analyzed the data: SL EU SW JE. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: SL MW SC GH PKK BB. Wrote the paper: SL.