The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) develop, implement and administer several different patient experience surveys. These surveys ask patients (or in some cases their families) about their experiences with, and ratings of, their health care providers and plans, including hospitals, home health care agencies, doctors, and health and drug plans, among others. The surveys focus on matters that patients themselves say are important to them and for which patients are the best and/or only source of information. CMS publicly reports the results of its patient experience surveys, and some surveys affect payments to CMS providers.

Patient experience surveys focus on how patients experienced or perceived key aspects of their care, not how satisfied they were with their care. Patient experience surveys focus on asking patients whether or how often they experienced critical aspects of health care, including communication with their doctors, understanding their medication instructions, and the coordination of their healthcare needs.