|
||
Monday,
July 31, 2006 All hospitals that wish to enroll or remain enrolled in the Reporting Hospital Quality Data for Annual Payment Update program for fiscal year 2007 must complete the revised Notice of Participation form now available at www.qualitynet.org. The form must be signed by the hospital’s chief executive officer and received by Ohio KePRO no later than Tuesday, Aug. 15, 2006. Hospitals that sign up must submit AMI, heart failure, pneumonia and SCIP measure sets to the QNet data warehouse effective with July 2006 discharges. If a hospital elects to withdraw from participation in the program, it should submit a Withdrawal of Participation form, available at www.qualitynet.org to Ohio KePRO. KePRO must receive this form no later than Aug. 15, 2006. If the hospital withdraws from the program, it will receive a 2.0 percentage point reduction to its payment update. (Rosalie Weakland, rosaliew@ohanet.org) CMS Grants Focus on Keeping Seniors, Disabled at Home The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) this week announced the Money Follows the Person (MFP) Rebalancing Demonstration, aimed at supporting elderly and disabled Medicaid recipients who wish to live in the community rather than institutions. Enacted by the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005, the MFP rebalancing demonstration is one piece of a comprehensive strategy to assist states in making widespread changes to their long-term care support systems. Through competitive grants, CMS will give states a total of $1.75 billion over five years to help shift Medicaid from its historical emphasis on institutional long-term care services to a system that offers more choices for seniors and people of all age groups with disabilities. States interested in applying for a MFP grant can propose new programs to CMS that are focused on sustaining people in their homes and communities who would otherwise have received care in a nursing home or other institution. Qualified expenditures may be eligible for an enhanced match from the federal government—the federal government will pay for 75 to 90 percent of the costs of transitioning individuals out of nursing home and into community settings an the associated long-term benefit costs. View a news release with more information at www.hhs.gov/news/press/2006pres/20060726.html. Download application forms and more information at www.grants.gov/. Is there a pharmacy in your facility? The Health Policy Institute has a grant to develop health information exchange in Ohio and it is holding a series of meetings to gather information. The pharmacy meeting will be held in Columbus Aug. 14 from 1:30-4:30 p.m. Visit http://hispc.pbwiki.com/Events for more information or to register.
Tuesday, August 1, 2006
The bill excludes the tedious provision, added shortly before the bill went to the House floor, that would have required hospitals to report the range of prices received from private payers and insurers for specified services to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The House bill now awaits reconciliation with a U.S. Senate version of the legislation, expected later this autumn. (Jonathan Archey, jonathana@ohanet.org)
Joint Commission Requests Comments on Accreditation Manuals The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) continues to strive for improvement of its accreditation manuals by requesting feedback from all manual users on the Management of Human Resources, Management of Information and Improving Organization Performance chapters. Short questionnaires pertaining to specific chapters have been created and are posted on JCAHO’s Web site.
Hospital-based
behavioral health program workers are asked to complete the
Hospital Manual questionnaire. Additional chapters will be
available for comment in the upcoming weeks. To comment on the
accreditation manuals visit
www.jointcommission.org/AccreditationPrograms/stds_review.htm.
(Rosalie Weakland,
rosaliew@ohanet.org)
CMS Releases Final Medicare IPPS Rule The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) this week released its hospital inpatient prospective payment system final rule for 2007, incorporating many of the changes suggested by OHA and other allied associations. CMS substantially modified its new weight calculation method and will phase in the revisions over a three-year transition period. As a result, the extreme losses that some hospitals would have experienced under the original CMS proposal will be significantly reduced. The new diagnosis-related group (DRG) provisions include moving DRG payment weights from charge-based to cost-based weights and by creating 20 new DRG groupings, bringing the total to 546 instead of the 861 in the proposed rule. CMS also will require that hospitals submit data on an additional 12 specific quality measures starting this July, instead of January, to receive a full update. OHA sent additional information to hospital chief financial officers and directors of reimbursement today. A detailed analysis will follow shortly. The final rule will also be on the agenda at OHA’s annual Medicare/Medicaid policy and payment seminar scheduled for Sept. 27 in Columbus. View related CMS fact sheets at www.cms.hhs.gov/apps/media/press/release.asp?Counter=1922 and www.cms.hhs.gov/apps/media/press/release.asp?Counter=1923. (Berna Bell, bernab@ohanet.org; Charles Cataline, charlesc@ohanet.org) Hospitals’ Heartbeat A 2006 nominee for the Albert E. Dyckes Health Care Worker of the Year Award
Susan Knight,
RN
A look inside
Susan’s nomination –
Thursday,
August 3, 2006 The Ohio Department of Commerce recently announced that the amount of unclaimed funds reported to and paid out by the state last fiscal year topped all previous records. The agency said it paid a total of $64.4 million in fiscal year 2006, a 19.4 percent increase over the previous year. The amount of reported unclaimed funds jumped 20.1 percent over the year, slightly topping $210 million. The payouts recorded last fiscal year were made on 43,714 claims, and most of the payments were identified through the division’s online search function. The state maintains custody of $970 million held under 3.2 million accounts. Search for unclaimed funds at www.unclaimedfundstreasurehunt.ohio.gov/. (Bridget Gargan, bridgetg@ohanet.org)
Hospitals’ Heartbeat A 2006 nominee for the Albert E. Dyckes Health Care Worker of the Year Award
Gayle O’Brien Director, Quality Improvement and Patient Safety Officer Akron General Medical Center Akron
A look inside Gayle’s nomination – Gayle O’Brien has been a great leader at Akron General Medical Center for more than 17 years. In addition to directing the medical center’s quality improvement initiatives, Gayle has been a strong champion for patient safety and has helped to position AGMC at the cutting edge in this important arena. As director of quality improvement, Gayle’s department has kept the entire organization at the leading edge of quality improvement and patient safety. Through her passion and drive, she is able to infuse a quality and safety orientation throughout the entire organization. Gayle’s role as Director of Quality Improvement has positioned her well to be very influential within the organization, and Gayle has used that opportunity well to lead quality and safety improvement efforts.
On July 28, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) announced an initiative to test and implement an initial set of core performance measures for hospital-based, inpatient psychiatric services. The five candidate measures in the set address the following quality-related dimensions of care: assessment of potential risks, previous trauma, co-existence of substance abuse and patient strengths, restraint use, seclusion use, patient discharge on multiple antipsychotic medications and provision of discharge assessment and aftercare recommendations to responsible community health providers upon discharge.
Beginning Jan. 1, 2007, JCAHO-accredited psychiatric hospitals are asked to begin voluntarily testing the measures for a one-year period. JCAHO expects to have a final set by fall 2008.
Psychiatric hospitals wishing to participate in the testing of the candidate measures should contact Frank Zibrat, associate director, ORYX Implementation, accreditation operations, at 630.792.5992 or fzibrat@jcaho.org. View a full news release at www.jointcommission.org/NewsRoom/NewsReleases/nr_07_28_06.htm. (Rosalie Weakland, rosaliew@ohanet.org)
Want to share a hospital employee perspective on public health? The Health Policy Institute has a grant to develop health information exchange in Ohio and it is holding a series of meetings to gather feedback from various stakeholders, including hospitals. The public health meeting will be held in Columbus Aug. 16 from 1:30 - 4:30 p.m. Visit http://hispc.pbwiki.com/Events for more information or to register. (Kim Keiser, kimk@ohanet.org) © 2001-2008 OHA. Last updated
January 03, 2008. |
