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The Benchmark Email
...benchmarks, strategies and ideas for improving
your agency
A service of Fazzi Associates, Inc.
October 22, 2007
CMS Announces Plan for the Home Health
Pay for Performance Demonstration
Question: I’ve heard
that the outcome measures for the Pay for Performance demonstration have
been announced. Do you know which outcomes will be used?
Answer:
Yes, the patient outcomes and the states chosen for the demonstration
are available. On Thursday, October 11, 2007, CMS announced the plan
for the Home Health Pay for Performance (P4P) Demonstration which is
scheduled to begin on January 1, 2008. Click
here to access the press release.
The demonstration is
scheduled to run for two years in the following 7 states:
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Connecticut,
Massachusetts, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Illinois, and
California. |
The press release
indicates that CMS will be soliciting agencies to participate in the
demonstration later this month. Home Health agencies that volunteer to
participate in the demonstration will be assigned to a study group or a
control group. Agencies with the best outcome results or with the most
improvement will be eligible for incentive payments. Participating
agencies will not experience payment reduction as a result of
participation in the demonstration.
The 7 performance
measures to be used in the demonstration are:
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Incidence of
Acute Care Hospitalization |
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Incidence of
Any Emergent Care |
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Improvement
in Bathing |
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Improvement
in Ambulation/Locomotion |
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Improvement
in Transferring |
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Improvement
in Status of Surgical Wounds |
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Improvement
in Management of Oral Medications |
All of these measures
will be publicly reported by January 2008.
Regardless of whether
or not your agency is located in a state chosen for the demonstration
project, consistently improving Home Health Compare outcomes and
preventing avoidable hospitalizations now is essential because most
agencies in the country are concerned about improving these quality
measures. If your agency’s results are not strong, Fazzi recommends all of
these specific initiatives to improve your results:
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Documentation Audits - to identify where you have
problems and successes, |
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OASIS
Training - to provide clinical staff and managers with the current
information, skills and confidence to conduct accurate
assessments, |
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Performance Improvement
Initiatives - to advance case management practices and, |
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Measurement your results
- to better manage the agency’s quality
initiatives. |
Future Home Health
Compare Quality Charts distributed through the benchmark email will
include the new publicly reported outcome measures* and identify those
used in the P4P Demonstration.
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