On June 4, 2010, at the Florida Hospital Association Meeting, the Health Research & Educational Trust provided this presentation, "Reducing Avoidable Hospital Readmissions," to give recent evidence of the extent and causes of avoidable hospital readmissions, describe congressional action in Patient Protection and Coverage Act, and describe support now available to help hospitals respond to heightened concern and financial pressures.
The presentation can be downloaded here: http://www.ahrq.gov/news/kt/red/readmissionslides/readmission.ppt
Within the presentation, the HRET's Health Care Leader Action Guide to Reduce Avoidable Readmissions is referenced. It can be downloaded here: http://www.commonwealthfund.org/~/media/Files/Publications/Fund%20Report/2010/Jan/Readmission%20Guide/Health%20Care%20Leader%20Readmission%20Guide_Final.pdf
With readmission rates already being publicly reported and penalties scheduled to be imposed on hospitals with "excessive" readmission rates starting Oct 2013, now is a great time to optimize the care transition process.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Joint Commission Publishes Roadmap towards Patient Centered and Family Centered Care
Patient centeredness is probably the most difficult to define and thus difficult to improve dimension of healthcare quality (the other dimensions being safety, timeliness, effectiveness, efficiency, and equability). Nevertheless, sensitivity to the concepts surrounding patient centeredness is essential for a multitude of clinical and strategic reasons.
To help hospitals prepare for the Joint Commission's upcoming Patient-Centered Communication accreditation standards, the Joint Commission recently published a monograph titled Advancing Effective Communication, Cultural Competence, and Patient- and Family-Centered Care: A Roadmap for Hospitals.
The monograph can be download here.
To help hospitals prepare for the Joint Commission's upcoming Patient-Centered Communication accreditation standards, the Joint Commission recently published a monograph titled Advancing Effective Communication, Cultural Competence, and Patient- and Family-Centered Care: A Roadmap for Hospitals.
The monograph can be download here.
Sunday, August 1, 2010
CMS Posts Final FY11 Inpatient Rules, Payment Updates, and RHQDAPU Measures.
On Friday afternoon, CMS issued a press release announcing that the final FY11 inpatient prospective payment system rules have been posted to the Federal Register.
Excerpts of the press release is cut and pasted below wiht items of interest to healthcare quality professionals in red:
"In today’s action, CMS is updating acute care hospital rates by 2.35 percent. This update reflects a market basket increase of 2.6 percent for inflation, which is a slight increase over the FY 2010 inflation rate. The final rule reduces the 2.6 percent inflation update by 0.25 percent, as required by the Affordable Care Act. Further, CMS will apply a “documentation and coding” adjustment of -2.9 percent. Hospital coding practices following adoption of the Medicare severity DRGs increased aggregate payments to hospitals, but did not reflect actual increases in patients’ severity of illness. Under legislation passed in 2007, CMS is required to recoup the entire amount of FY 2008 and 2009 excess spending due to changes in hospital coding practices no later than FY 2012. CMS has determined that a -5.8 percent adjustment is necessary to recoup these overpayments. The -2.9 percent adjustment for FY 2011 is one-half of this amount. CMS estimates that payments to general acute care hospitals for operating expenses in FY 2011 will decline by 0.4 percent, or $440 million, compared with FY 2010 under the final rule, taking into account all factors that would affect spending."
"The final rule adds 12 measures to the RHQDAPU set, and retires one current measure – Mortality for selected surgical procedures (composite). However, only 10 of the new measures – including rates of occurrence for 8 of 10 categories of conditions that are subject to the hospital-acquired conditions (HACs) policy ‑ will be considered in determining a hospital’s FY 2012 update. The remaining 2 measures to be reported in 2011 would be considered in determining the hospital’s FY 2013 update."
The 1877 page document can be found here: http://www.ofr.gov/OFRUpload/OFRData/2010-19092_PI.pdf
Excerpts of the press release is cut and pasted below wiht items of interest to healthcare quality professionals in red:
"In today’s action, CMS is updating acute care hospital rates by 2.35 percent. This update reflects a market basket increase of 2.6 percent for inflation, which is a slight increase over the FY 2010 inflation rate. The final rule reduces the 2.6 percent inflation update by 0.25 percent, as required by the Affordable Care Act. Further, CMS will apply a “documentation and coding” adjustment of -2.9 percent. Hospital coding practices following adoption of the Medicare severity DRGs increased aggregate payments to hospitals, but did not reflect actual increases in patients’ severity of illness. Under legislation passed in 2007, CMS is required to recoup the entire amount of FY 2008 and 2009 excess spending due to changes in hospital coding practices no later than FY 2012. CMS has determined that a -5.8 percent adjustment is necessary to recoup these overpayments. The -2.9 percent adjustment for FY 2011 is one-half of this amount. CMS estimates that payments to general acute care hospitals for operating expenses in FY 2011 will decline by 0.4 percent, or $440 million, compared with FY 2010 under the final rule, taking into account all factors that would affect spending."
"The final rule adds 12 measures to the RHQDAPU set, and retires one current measure – Mortality for selected surgical procedures (composite). However, only 10 of the new measures – including rates of occurrence for 8 of 10 categories of conditions that are subject to the hospital-acquired conditions (HACs) policy ‑ will be considered in determining a hospital’s FY 2012 update. The remaining 2 measures to be reported in 2011 would be considered in determining the hospital’s FY 2013 update."
The 1877 page document can be found here: http://www.ofr.gov/OFRUpload/OFRData/2010-19092_PI.pdf
- Changes to RHQDAPU start on page 505.
- The list of 47 measures adopted for FY11 start on page 517.
- The list of 55 measures adopted for FY12 start on page 567.
- The list of 57 measures adopted for FY13 start on page 595.
- The list of 60 measures adopted for FY14 start on page 606.
- A list of future potential measures being considered for adoption into RHQDAPU starts on page 608.
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