Resources available to help hospitals combat emerging cyber threats
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Recently, the American Hospital Association (AHA) sent out a cybersecurity advisory to its members. The AHA is working with federal partners to enhance information sharing and disseminate best practices for protecting critical infrastructure from cyberattacks. A suite of resources, ranging from podcasts on emerging threats to leadership questions for hospital leaders and trustees, can be found on a special webpage at http://www.aha.org/cybersecurity.
The AHA will continue to educate health care leaders on the importance of cybersecurity. On Tuesday, May 3, at the AHA Annual Membership Meeting in Washington, D.C., the AHA will host a special executive briefing session on cybersecurity and questions hospital leaders need to ask. „Online and Secure: How Cybersecurity Challenges Affect Health Care” will be moderated by AHA Board of Trustees member Melinda L. Estes, MD, president and CEO of Saint Luke’s Health System, and feature Michael Daniel, special assistant to the president and the White House cybersecurity coordinator; Jane Lute, CEO of the Center for Internet Security and former deputy secretary of Homeland Security; and Richard Miller, president and CEO of Virtua. Visit http://www.aha.org to register for this session.
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American College of Surgeons releases principles on intraoperative responsibility of primary surgeon
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The American College of Surgeons (ACS) has released a Statement on Principles on the responsibility of the primary surgeon during surgery. Recent news reports had raised questions about the primary surgeon initiating a second surgery before the first surgery was fully completed. These reports led to a larger discussion of the reasons why surgeons may leave an operating room during the course of a surgery and the appropriate actions that need to be taken to inform the patient and ensure continued safe care. ACS states: „The primary attending surgeon is personally responsible for the patent’s welfare throughout the operation. In general, the patent’s primary attending surgeon should be in the operating suite or be immediately available for the entire surgical procedure. There are instances consistent with good patient care that are valid exceptions. However, when the primary attending surgeon is not present or immediately available, another attending surgeon should be assigned as being immediately available.” In a joint statement, American Hospital Association (AHA) President and CEO Rick Pollack and Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) President and CEO Darrell Kirch, MD, lent their support to the principles, saying, „We commend the ACS for issuing guidance that reinforces the practices of hospitals around the nation and recognizes the need for residents to train under appropriate supervision. The guidance’s emphasis on the surgeon’s primary role in assuring the patent’s welfare, and in effectively communicating with patients about the team who will participate in the surgical procedures, will be a useful yardstick for every hospital. The AHA and AAMC will share ACS’ guidance with all hospitals and encourage them to use it as a foundation for reviewing their own policies and practices and to stimulate discussion with their own medical staff about other ways to enhance their ongoing efforts to improve quality, safety and patient communication.”
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Submission deadline extended for AHA-AMGA Learning Fellowship
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The AHA’s Physician Leadership Forum is collaborating with the American Medical Group Association (AMGA) to create an opportunity for members to participate in a learning fellowship on managing population health and succeeding in the new physician payment models that take effect in 2019. The call for participation is available at www.ahaphysicianforum.org/fellowship.
The AHA-AMGA Learning Fellowship is a comprehensive program that addresses critical success factors such as leadership, culture, structure, execution, alignment, reimbursement, and physician compensation. Working together, we will provide participating organizations and their employed physicians with the skills and information to move from a traditional hospital-owned/employed model to a more organized, integrated system of care delivery for the purpose of managing population health. The fellowship will begin in July 2016 and end in October 2017. The submission deadline has been extended to April 22, 2016.
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CMS announces new primary care medical home model
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Public and private payers can apply through June 1 to participate in a new medical home model that will build on the Comprehensive Primary Care (CPC) model to help practices support patients with serious or chronic diseases, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced recently. Under the CPC Plus model, CMS will partner with commercial insurers and state Medicaid agencies in up to 20 regions to provide monthly care management fees based on beneficiary risk tiers. Beginning July 15, CMS will solicit applications from primary care practices in the selected regions to participate in one of two tracks. Track 1 practices will continue to receive Medicare fee-for-service payments, while Track 2 practices will receive a mixture of up-front CPC payment and reduced Medicare fee-for-service payment. Track 2 practices must provide more comprehensive services for patients with complex medical and behavioral health needs and obtain a commitment from their health information technology vendors to support related health IT capabilities. Both tracks also will be eligible for performance-based incentive payments. CMS will host an informational webinar on the models April 19 at 3:00 p.m. ET. For more on the five-year project, see the CMS factsheet.
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Verification of graduate medical education
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Over time, hospitals and their medical staff services offices have developed unique forms to verify resident training for credentialing as required for hospital accreditation. Most facilities seek verification of resident training within the past five years from the primary source, the residency program, which can lead to challenges.
The American Hospital Association, in partnership with the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, the National Association of Medical Staff Services, and the Organization of Program Director Associations and others developed a workgroup to discuss options to alleviate this problem while still meeting hospital credentialing needs. To address the issue, the group developed a template letter and form that would provide the necessary information to meet credentialing needs while reducing the need for program directors to complete multiple requests for information.
To access the document, click here.
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IDSA and SHEA release new guidelines on implementing an antibiotic stewardship program
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The Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) and Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA) have released a new set of guidelines on implementing an antibiotic stewardship program. Some of these include having providers get preauthorization for use of antibiotics before they are prescribed, as well as having a prospective review with the prescribing clinician to optimize antibiotic treatments. The guidelines also call for rapid diagnostic testing to determine if a specimen is viral or not and reducing the use of antibiotics associated with Clostridium difficile infection.
In a press release, Tamar Barlam, MD, lead co-author of the guidelines, director of the antibiotic stewardship program at Boston Medical Center and associate professor of medicine at Boston University Medical School said, „While these programs do save hospitals money, their most important benefit is that they improve patient outcomes and reduce the emergence of antibiotic resistance. When we say stewardship, we really mean stewardship, and increasingly, doctors are realizing it’s important and necessary.” The full guidelines are available free on the IDSA website at www.idsociety.org and on the SHEA website at www.shea-online.org.
The PLF has championed the appropriate use of antibiotics. In 2014 the PLF, in partnership with several national organizations, created an antimicrobial stewardship toolkit composed of resources for hospitals and health systems, clinicians and patients.
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CMS updates guidance for electronic clinical quality measure reporting
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The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) recently issued an appendix to the Quality Reporting Data Architecture (QRDA) Implementation Guide for hospitals and eligible professionals submitting electronic clinical quality measures (eCQMs) to Medicare quality reporting programs for calendar year 2016. The appendix updates information on the QRDA Category I and III reports, technically corrects some of the QRDA templates and clarifies elements used for hospital eCQM calculations. Hospitals participating in the inpatient quality reporting program must submit third- or fourth-quarter data for four eCQMs in the QRDA-I format for CY 2016. CMS also pre-released information on 2017 changes to the eCQM standards, terminology and measure specifications. The annual update of the eCQMs will be published this month. For more on hospital inpatient quality reporting eCQMs, visit the Center for Quality Reporting and Electronic Clinical Quality Improvement Resource Center.
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ICD-10 to add thousands of new diagnosis and procedure codes in FY 2017
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The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will add about 1,900 diagnosis codes and 3,651 hospital inpatient procedure codes to the ICD-10 coding system for health care claims in fiscal year 2017, the agencies announced recently. The large number of new codes is due to a partial freeze on updates to the ICD-10-CM and ICD-10 PCS codes prior to implementation of ICD-10 on Oct. 1, 2015. Both new and revised PCS codes are available at www.cms.gov.
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Next PLF webinar to focus on clinical learning environments and GME
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Join the AHA’s Physician Leadership Forum and the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) on Wednesday, Apr. 27 beginning at 2:30 p.m. ET to learn about building excellence in clinical learning environments for graduate medical education.
Presenter Kevin B. Weiss, MD, MPH, senior vice president for Institutional Accreditation with ACGME, will discuss the purpose of the Clinical Learning Environment Review (CLER) program along with the core themes noted in the report of findings from the first cycle of nearly 300 CLER site visits. He will highlight some of the progress made toward engaging resident and fellow physicians to improve patient safety, health care quality, and other focus areas as well as high-leverage opportunities for improvement.
To register for this complimentary webinar, click here.
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ACGME Pursuing Excellence Initiative Creating Value for Clinical Leadership
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There is still time to apply for the funding award as part of the Pursuing Excellence in Clinical Learning Environments initiative. The Request for Proposal (RFP), due May 4, 2016, seeks Sponsoring Institutions willing to embark on a four-year journey of innovation to transform the clinical learning environment.
This unique opportunity offers organizations a chance to engage in an immersive collaborative learning experience.
As part of the RFP, the ACGME and its 21 partners in Pursuing Excellence, including the American Hospital Association, are requesting the support and commitment of hospital and health system CEOs and board members to lead change and innovation.
CEOs and board members who participate in the leadership track of Pursuing Excellence will collaborate with each other and their clinical teams to develop and test new strategic practices that will optimize the role of graduate medical education as a key component of a systems-based approach to improving patient care. Through this program CEOs will get an opportunity to share their experiences and hear from their colleagues about successful practices.
To learn more about the Pursuing Excellence initiative visit the web page. The ACGME is also hosting an Informational webinar April 25, 2016, 1:00-2:00 p.m. CT.
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PSH Summit 2016: Experts convene to share latest insights on perioperative surgical home
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On June 24-26, Chicago, Illinois, will be ground zero for those interested in learning about the innovative, rapidly growing Perioperative Surgical Home (PSH) model of care. The PSH is a multi-departmental initiative aimed at transforming surgical care by improving quality, lowering costs and increasing patient and provider satisfaction. Baba Shiv, BE, MBA, PhD, Director of the Innovative Technology Leader Executive Program at Stanford, will open the conference on Saturday morning. Dr. Shiv is a world-renowned expert on neuroeconomics, specifically on the role of neural structures and how they relate to emotion and motivation in helping to shape decisions. Conference session themes include „Prehabilitation,” „Intraoperative Management,” „Postoperative/Post-discharge Phase,” „Discover, Teach, Heal,” and „Real Life Implementation of the PSH.” Exhibitors will be on hand Friday and Saturday to feature products and services germane to the PSH.
Early-bird registration rates end May 2. To learn more or register, click here.
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FEATURED RESOURCE
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Verification for Graduate Medical Education
For more resources, visit our website.
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