CMS Core Measures Compliance: Best Practices for Data Collection, Analysis and Reporting
For many hospitals, the primary challenge with the core measure program is not achieving quality standards, but complying with the complex, time-consuming reporting process and staying current with constantly changing regulations.
QA Paediatric dentistry department, Hospital Melaka 2020
Amphion Medical: Core Measure Compliance
1. Core Measures
CMS Core Measures Compliance:
Best Practices for Data Collection,
Analysis and Reporting
Complex Compliance
Avoiding the Fallout
A Shortage of Talent
Maintaining Compliance
Seeking Outside Help
Maximum Value
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Welcome
Complex
Compliance
Avoidingthe
Fallout
AShortage
ofTalent
Maintaining
Compliance
Seeking
OutsideHelp
Maximum
Value123456
2. Welcome
Complex
Compliance
Avoidingthe
Fallout
AShortage
ofTalent
Maintaining
Compliance
Seeking
OutsideHelp
Maximum
Value123456
Welcome!
The expectation for hospitals to achieve certain quality
standards is not new. The formation of the National
Quality Forum (NQF) in 1999 got the ball rolling with its
focus on care outcomes. The Joint Commission took it a
step further in 2001 with publication of the now-annual
Top Performers on Key Quality Measures – and since
2002 has required accredited hospitals to report
performance data.
Since 2003, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid
Services (CMS) has linked Medicare reimbursement
levels to quality measures performance. Leapfrog Group
and Health Grades have also entered the fray.i
However, it was implementation of the Value-based
Purchasing Program, part of the Patient Protection and
Affordable Care Act of 2010, that truly turned up the
heat on hospitals in terms of demonstrating quality
outcomes. For the first time, hospitals would receive
bonuses—or be penalized—for their performance on an
evolving set of CMS/Joint Commission core measures.ii
For many hospitals, the primary challenge with the core
measure program is not achieving quality standards,
but complying with the complex, time-consuming
reporting process and staying current with constantly
changing regulations.
i
Scott, L. It’s all about the outcomes. HHN magazine. December 2010. http://www.hhnmag.com/hhnmag/jsp/articledisplay.
jsp?dcrpath=HHNMAG/Article/data/12DEC2010/1210HHN_Coverstorydomain=HHNMAG.
ii
Rau J. How hospitals’quality bonuses and penalties were determined and how to use the data. Kaiser Health News.
December 20, 2012. http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/stories/2012/december/21/value-based-purchasing-methodology.aspx.
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4. Welcome
Complex
Compliance
Avoidingthe
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ofTalent
Maintaining
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For better or worse, core measures are now the basis for
reimbursement under Medicare’s pay-for-performance initiative.
A growing number of payers also look at core measure performance
during contract negotiations. As a result, hospitals need to develop a
healthy respect for the financial impact of noncompliance.
At minimum, financial penalties translate into a 1.25 percent reduction
in reimbursements in fiscal year (FY) 2014, increasing annually by
0.25 percent until it caps out at 2 percent in FY 2017.iii
Further, with CMS
publishing core measures data on its public website, noncompliance
could also affect a hospital’s reputation among its patient population.
As the stakes get higher, so does the level of difficulty involved in
maintaining compliant reporting processes. The number of required
measures has continued to climb, increasing the level of difficulty
involved with abstracting and validating the data. Exacerbating the
challenge is a limited supply of internal resources and expertise that can
be dedicated to reporting to ensure processes and data definitions are
current and protocols are in place to guide appropriate documentation
and abstraction.
Balancing reporting requirements with the plethora of additional
core duties for which quality departments are now responsible is a
resource balancing act. It is rarely feasible to have abstractors dedicated
exclusively—or even primarily—to reporting. As the number of metrics
that must be reported under the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting
(IQR) program increases with no corresponding change to submission
deadlines, though, it has become nearly impossible for hospitals to
stay on top of core measures reporting requirements without a
dedicated team.
Consider that the 2005 starter set for the IQR program included just 10
chart-abstracted measures. By 2010, the set had expanded to 44 different
measures, including 26 chart-abstracted, 1 survey, 16 claims-based and
1 structural measure. In 2013, the total had increased to 57. By 2016,
hospitals will be required to report on 60 different measures, including
42 chart-abstracted, 1 survey, 12 claims-based and 5 structural.iv
The complexity of reporting is also escalating. Regulatory policies and
recommendations from CMS and The Joint Commission tend to change
from one reporting period to the next, while protocols and guidelines
are revised and expanded annually. For example, when CMS revised
the OP-19 Emergency Department (ED) Transition Record, it became
too complex for many hospitals to manage. Compliant documentation
required inclusion of all the following:
» Major procedures and tests performed during the ED visit
» Principal diagnosis at discharge or chief complaint
» Patient instructions
» The plan for follow-up care (or a statement that none was required),
including designation of the primary physician, other healthcare
professional or website to provide follow-up care
» A list of new medications and changes to continued medications
the patient should take post-discharge, with the quantity
prescribed and/or dispensed (or intended duration) and
instructions for each
Hospitals had little time to create such a detailed and cumbersome
document within their electronic medical record (EMR) systems. As a
result, nearly all failed to comply. CMS eventually suspended the measure
until further notice, but not until the damage was done for the majority
of facilities.v
iii
Is your hospital ready for value-based purchasing? [fact sheet]. Health Services Advisory Group. 2013. http://www.hsag.com/App_Resources/Documents/VBP_factsheet_-FLCA_508.pdf.
iv
https://www.cms.gov/Medicare/Quality-Initiatives-Patient-Assessment-Instruments/HospitalQualityInits/HospitalRHQDAPU.html
v
CMS proposes hospital outpatient and ambulatory surgical centers policy and payment changes for 2014 [fact sheet]. Centers for Medicare Medicaid Services. July 8, 2013.
http://www.cms.gov/Newsroom/MediaReleaseDatabase/Fact-Sheets/2013-Fact-Sheets-Items/2013-07-08-3.html.
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6. Welcome
Complex
Compliance
Avoidingthe
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AShortage
ofTalent
Maintaining
Compliance
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OutsideHelp
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Value123456
To avoid accumulating financial penalties and productivity-sapping backlogs,
hospitals must not view core measures reporting as an occasional responsibility. Proper
resources must be dedicated to keeping processes current against the rising tide of
regulatory and guideline changes taking place throughout the year. These include
regulatory policies and recommendations from CMS and The Joint Commission, which
tend to change from one reporting period to the next, and protocols and guidelines that
are revised and expanded annually.
This shifting regulatory landscape can make it difficult to ensure reporting processes are
consistently compliant without a resource dedicated to monitoring regulatory change and
educating clinicians and staff on current and new core measures and proper abstraction.
Consider the fallout if CMS makes just one change in its Surgical Care Improvement
Project (SCIP) documentation requirements between quarterly reporting periods. If the
change is missed, the documentation won’t be created and the hospital will fail on that
measure—which can directly and negatively impact the bottom line.
Dedicating resources and proper training is crucial to taming the chaos of a highly
complex, time-consuming process that significantly impacts a hospital’s financial and
competitive standing. This includes tasking one individual with continuously monitoring
and communicating any changes to guidelines, metrics or requirements so they can
immediately be integrated into the reporting process. Additionally, abstractors must be
properly trained and credentialed to ensure they are capable of managing the overall
process. For the validation piece alone, this entails maintaining skill levels sufficient to
achieve accuracy levels of no less than 75 percent.
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The complexity inherent in core measures reporting is not the only
challenge hospitals are facing: The growing demand for qualified abstractors has created
a growing shortage. As difficult as it is to recruit and retain abstractors with the skills and
experience to meet performance standards, the potential price for failing to do so is too
high to lower standards. Thus, careful evaluation is critical to ensuring the right people are
in place to manage every stage of the process.
Hospitals should seek out abstractors with health information management (HIM)
credentials, such as Registered Health Information Technician (RHIT), Registered Healthcare
Documentation Specialist (RHDS), Certified Healthcare Documentation Specialist (CHDS),
Certified Medical Abstractor, Certified Coding Associate (CCA) and Certified Coding
Specialist (CCS). Such credentials ensure individuals have the proper background in
medical terminology and a comprehensive understanding of the patient medical record.
Clinical credentials, such as Registered Nurse (RN) and Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN) are
also important. They ensure individuals have a strong understanding of how the human
body works and are prepared for the stronger base of clinical knowledge required for more
advanced core measures and as codes transition from ICD-9 to ICD-10.
Prospects should undergo proficiency testing to ensure skills are where they need to
be. This should comprise both inpatient and outpatient questions from the current core
measures set and its corresponding specifications manual. The best abstractors will pass
with a score of at least 95 percent, which demonstrates a sufficient understanding of core
measures and their impact on the hospital’s performance score.
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10. Welcome
Complex
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Avoidingthe
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In addition to ensuring the proper team is in place, hospitals should also
evaluate the core measure reporting process itself to identify and eliminate any gaps,
aberrant patterns or areas of weakness contributing to backlogs or missed deadlines.
More importantly, evaluation will identify areas of weakness on the front end, such as with
clinical documentation, which should be addressed through education or documentation
improvement initiatives.
The evaluation of the core measures reporting process should focus on three areas:
deadline compliance, validation rates and regulatory comprehension.
Missed deadlines can almost always be traced back to a lack of resources. Integrating
reporting requirements with the additional core duties for which quality departments
are now responsible is a delicate balance, particularly given the rapid rise in the number
of IQR metrics.
When abstractors must divide their time and attention between core measures reporting
and their regular responsibilities, backlogs can quickly develop and deadlines are often
missed. Once one deadline is missed, catching up is difficult without additional resources
dedicated to the process.
Overextended abstractors may also struggle to maintain appropriate validation scores,
which should be in the 90-95 percent range. Consistently low scores may signal the
need for additional training, creating yet another Catch-22. How do you set aside time
for training to bring scores up when heavy workloads are contributing factors to the
performance issue?
Finding the answer to that question and addressing other issues uncovered by the analysis
are important. They will streamline reporting, improve compliance and create a means
by which documentation and processes can be enhanced and best practices put into
place to drive improvements to publicly reported core measures. They will not only result
in reporting that is compliant in terms of content and deadlines but also very likely help
improve core measures performance, which will ultimately benefit the facility financially
and boost its reputations for excellence among its patient population.
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Complex
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Avoidingthe
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Because process weaknesses can often be traced back to insufficient
resources, a growing number of hospitals are outsourcing their core measures abstracting
to HIM vendors, thus freeing internal resources to focus on core responsibilities.
However, to realize the full value of outsourcing core measures reporting, finding
the right partner is imperative.
As with any relationship, the success or failure of outsourcing core measure reporting rests
on the quality of the partner selected.
Look for a partner employing only credentialed abstractors with a minimum of 3–5 years of
experience, all of whom should have passed a stringent proficiency test. The firm should be
able to deliver an accuracy rate of no less than 95 percent. Finally, the firm should provide
services designed to strengthen the hospital’s core measures performance, including
weekly and quarterly education sessions, regular evaluations and recommendations
for improvement.
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Complex
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Regardless of whether they are managed in-house or outsourced
to a qualified vendor, reporting processes should be leveraged to drive improved core
measures performance by identifying gaps and recommending process enhancements
to close them.
One example would be a hospital consistently failing the substance or tobacco use
measure sets. An abstractor empowered to go beyond standard pass/fail core measure
reporting could trace that failure to clinicians’neglecting to query patients about their
smoking or alcohol use when completing admission documentation—a situation that
can be fixed by simply adding the query to or highlighting the query in the admission
order set.
At a higher level, a report can be generated that highlights every outlier in order to
identify the documentation issue causing the core measure failure. This report can
then be used to identify trends that can be corrected with adjustments to order sets
or documentation processes. It can even help identify individual clinicians who may
require additional education.
Improving core measure performance is a team effort. Providing those on the clinical
frontlines with the information they need to improve documentation will ultimately drive
quality outcomes. Doing so, however, requires strong, compliant and comprehensive
reporting processes that reveal the cause of the core measure failures so they can be
corrected and improved before they impact quality or the bottom line.
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