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Fifty-six hospitals from 50 states as well as U.S. territories, collaborating to improve surgical care, significantly cut the rate of surgical infections for more than 35,000 patients in a yearlong, nationwide effort sponsored by the Centers for Medicare & Medicare Services (CMS) and led by Qualis Health, the quality improvement organization (QIO) for Washington, Alaska, and Idaho.
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Now that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is requiring hospitals to submit data on 10 quality measures to get the full 3.7% inflation-adjusted payment increase, it is more important than ever for case managers to ensure accurate documentation.
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One of the better known ongoing collaborations in the United States is the Cambridge, MA-based Institute for Healthcare Improvements (IHI) 100,000 Lives Campaign, whose goal is to save 100,000 lives through targeted QI interventions by June 14, 2006.
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Since Childrens National Medical Center in Washington, DC, implemented its diabetes clinical pathway, the hospitals average length of stay for diabetes patients has been significantly lower than the national average, and the 72-hour readmission rate has been less than 1%.
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If youre not using your clinical pathways on a regular basis, youre missing an opportunity to facilitate the collection of quality indicators and outcomes information and to affect your patients length of stay.
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The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has made sweeping changes to the Inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS) that will have a major impact on hospital reimbursement.
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The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) will recommend to Congress that the moratorium on development of specialty hospitals, including surgical hospitals, be extended by 20 months to Jan. 1, 2007.
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Six states have enacted legislation supporting creation of state patient safety centers, and four of those states (Florida, Massachusetts, Oregon, and Pennsylvania) will focus on ambulatory surgery centers. All six, which also include Maryland and New York, will focus on hospitals. A recent report from the National Academy for State Health Policy in Portland, ME, examined the models in use in the six states.
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When a woman living near Lima, OH, started a service to provide free surgery to needy people overseas, she found a willing partner at nearby West Central Ohio Surgery and Endoscopy Center in Lima. The organization, called Childrens Medical Missions, sent a photo of a 10-year-old African boy needing a hernia operation to the center. She told the center a little about the child, and they decided to offer the surgery.
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On the fifth anniversary of the Institute of Medicines 1999 report on the high number of medical errors in this country, 66% of consumers surveyed said that they have talked to a surgeon about details of a proposed surgery to reduce the risk of experiencing a medical error when seeking treatment.
