How many steps did you take today? If you’re a Fitbit fan, you know precisely, and you’re not alone. Digital health devices were a $5 billion-plus growth industry last year, and the range of gadgets is expanding rapidly, from ear devices that measure blood pressure, respiration rate and oxygenation level, to iPhone cases that record […]
How Medicare is Moving from PQRS Basics into Value-Based Care: Improving Outcomes with Plan of Care
For a number of PQRS measures, Medicare requires that the provider document a Follow-up Plan or Plan of Care to demonstrate that appropriate interventions have been made to reduce risk. This has caused confusion and consternation among some of our clients who may not have clearly documented the follow-up plan or may disagree with Medicare […]
Avoid PQRS and VBPM Penalties and Achieve Long Term Revenues: How to Choose the Right QCDR
Can you optimize your Value-Based Payment Modifier (VBPM) quality and cost profile to demonstrate better outcomes than others and avoid both PQRS and VBPM penalties at the same time? Yes: Use a Qualified Clinical Data Registry (QCDR) to do both. In 2014, the initial year of QCDR reporting, providers had the opportunity to report non-PQRS […]
Medicare Is Playing by 2015 Rules—Are You?
Does it feel like 2015 yet? While we may fill out paperwork that reads “2014 2015” for the next few weeks, 2015 is here—and it’s different. Do you need evidence? The 2015 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule is officially in effect. Several hundred pages within the 1200-page “Final Rule” describe the rules for the 2015 Physician Quality […]
New Year’s Resolution: Know the Difference Between PQRS and Meaningful Use
No one wants another CMS penalty letter this coming year. Especially after the past two weeks, when many providers from coast to coast learned that their Medicare Part B reimbursements in 2015 will be cut by 1.5 percent, since they were eligible but did not participate in PQRS 2013. Caught by surprise, some providers were shocked […]
Season’s Greetings from CMS: You Owe 1.5 Percent for a PQRS Reporting Failure
‘Tis the season to be jolly—unless your health care organization is one of many last week that received a letter from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) informing you that at least one of your providers was eligible to participate in PQRS in 2013, but failed to do so—and that a penalty is […]
How to Energize Your Providers to Measure and Improve Outcomes
It’s no wonder that so many physicians feel threatened by the mention of outcomes measurement. All too often, outcomes are used as a club to punish providers who seem to weaken overall group performance. Or outcomes are packaged and applied in a way that doesn’t provide actionable information—which can seem like a waste of everyone’s […]
No More Blame Game: How to Use Patient Outcomes Measurement to Boost Quality and Provider Performance
Fair or not, if your patients don’t do well, your physicians can be tagged as poorly performing providers. But there are ways to change the dynamic for your organization by effectively using patient outcomes measurement to structure and drive a quality program that benefits both patients and providers. Tracking the health and status of patients—“how […]
Health Care 2014: Where Do We Go from Here?
This week, many of us will sit around Thanksgiving tables, giving thanks for our families and friends, food and shelter, and living in this good land. We might also say, this land where we have access to some of the best health care on earth. So how interesting that we have spent the last several […]
The Missing Dimension of Residencies That Will Affect Your Program’s Future
Residency programs need to change. I write this as a former family medicine residency program director who spent much of my professional life teaching residents and medical students. Specifically, residency programs need to get on track in the value-based health care world. To fail to do so is to become obsolete. Here‘s the problem: Like […]