More than 3,000 hospitals nationwide will receive the full Medicare payment update for 2009 after successfully participating in the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ new Hospital Outpatient Quality Data Reporting Program in 2008.
CMS has announced a success rate of 99.3 percent in the first year of the program, with 3,313 of the 3,339 hospitals that participated qualifying for the full market basket update. The remaining 26 hospitals, which either did not report the quality data successfully or did not have a QualityNet Administrator, will receive an update reduced by 2 percentage points, according to CMS.
Acting CMS Administrator Kerry Weams praised the program’s success in a news release: "We are extremely pleased to find that hospitals have responded so successfully to the new outpatient quality measure reporting program."
The measures hospitals were required to report on in 2008 included two related to surgical care:
the percentage of patients who receive an antibiotic within one hour before surgery; and
the percentage of patients who receive the correct antibiotic for infection prevention.
The other five measures were related to heart attack care. This year, CMS has added four imaging efficiency measures on which participating hospitals will be required to report.
More information on the quality data reporting program is available on CMS’ Web site.
—Irene Tsikitas
