15 Sep 2022
0
View Post
MVC and Members Promote Sepsis Awareness Month

MVC and Members Promote Sepsis Awareness Month

September 15, 2022 | 0 Comments | , , ,

Throughout the month of September, providers and advocacy groups are calling attention to the prevalence and signs of sepsis, the body’s life-threatening response to infection. It is the leading cause of death in U.S. hospitals, taking the life of a patient every two minutes and affecting an estimated 49 million people every year worldwide. Despite this, at least one in every three adults has never heard of sepsis. That is why in 2011 the Sepsis Alliance officially designated September as Sepsis Awareness Month.

To support its member hospitals in improving their outcomes related to sepsis, MVC collaborated with the Michigan Hospital Medicine Safety Consortium (HMS) in 2019 to develop a sepsis episode definition for its registry. MVC then began distributing sepsis push reports in 2020 with regular refreshes each year. Hospitals received their latest sepsis reports in April, which showcased wide variation across the Collaborative for measures such as total episode payments and 90-day readmission rates (see Figure 1). In addition, hospitals received details on their inpatient mortality and discharge to hospice rates compared to their geographic region and the Collaborative as a whole (see Figure 2). More information about this report was detailed in a previous MVC blog post.

Figure 1.

Figure 2.

MVC also began hosting a sepsis workgroup in June 2019 to help facilitate idea and practice sharing among Collaborative members. MVC has continued to host sepsis workgroups since then, with the most recent workgroup taking place last week on September 8. That workgroup honored Sepsis Awareness Month with a member panel featuring guest speakers from several health systems in Michigan. Attendees learned about current sepsis initiatives underway at hospitals throughout the state as well as insights on the impact of COVID-19, sepsis screening, sepsis bundle compliance, transitions of care, and other related topics. Those unable to attend can view the complete recording of this panel and discussion here.

One area of focus for this year’s Sepsis Awareness Month is a Sepsis Alliance tool to help providers remember the signs and symptoms. Their acronym approach asks providers to remember, “It’s about T-I-M-E,” with the word “time” representing temperature, infection, mental decline, and extremely ill (see Figure 3).

Figure 3.

This resource and many others have been created, collated, and packaged by the Sepsis Alliance in their yearly Sepsis Awareness Month Toolkit. Hospitals and providers are encouraged to utilize these resources to help educate their staff and patients. The hope is that through public education we can raise awareness of the signs and symptoms of sepsis so people in our communities know when to seek emergency care. Together, we can help save lives and limbs from sepsis. Learn more at sepsisawarenessmonth.org. To contact the MVC Coordinating Center about your sepsis reports, future workgroup speakers, or other questions, please email michiganvaluecollaborative@gmail.com.

08 Sep 2022
0
View Post
MVC Welcomes Usha Nuliyalu to Coordinating Center Team

MVC Welcomes Usha Nuliyalu to Coordinating Center Team

September 8, 2022 | 0 Comments |

I am excited to join the Michigan Value Collaborative (MVC) team as a data analyst, where I look forward to utilizing MVC’s robust data to support the vision and goals of the team. Along with a 50% effort at MVC, I am working at the Center for Healthcare Outcomes and Policy analyzing healthcare claims data for health policy research.

I earned a Master’s in Public Health degree in epidemiology from the University of Michigan (U-M) School of Public Health in 2009. I have worked at U-M since then analyzing data for various research projects. In the early part of my career, I worked for U-M’s School of Nursing and the Michigan Medicine Addiction Research Center, where I had many opportunities to work on data management and build on my knowledge. For the past six years, I have had the opportunity to work with Medicare and commercial claims data, performing statistical analysis and preparing summaries. I also have co-authored several research papers related to health policy.

I am passionate about improving health care quality and reducing disparity. I feel I can utilize my data analysis skills to help providers and policymakers understand what works best and support MVC and its members in achieving their goals. I am also looking forward to learning new research and analytic skills and growing as an analyst. When I am not working, I enjoy hiking, biking, gardening with my family, and music. If you have any questions, please reach out to me at nuliusha@med.umich.edu.

01 Sep 2022
0
View Post
Hospitals Receive PY22 Mid-Year Scorecards for MVC Component of BCBSM P4P Program

Hospitals Receive PY22 Mid-Year Scorecards for MVC Component of BCBSM P4P Program

September 1, 2022 | 0 Comments |

This week the Michigan Value Collaborative (MVC) Coordinating Center distributed the Mid-Year Scorecards for Program Year (PY) 2022 of the MVC Component of the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan (BCBSM) Pay-for-Performance (P4P) Program. These were the first scorecards for the new two-year program cycle for PYs 2022 and 2023.

PY2022 evaluates the index admissions from 2021 as the performance year against admissions in 2019 as the baseline year. MVC is using an improved z-score methodology to calculate both improvement and achievement scores. Hospitals will continue to receive the better of the two scores for each of their two selected conditions. For a description of how the program has changed from the last two-year cycle see the Change Document.

Additionally, this cycle offers hospitals bonus points for completing and submitting a survey for each selected condition by November 1, 2022. These surveys will be used by the MVC Coordinating Center to improve the program for future years and elicit improved best practice sharing between members. The full methodology for the new program can be found in the PY2022-2023 Technical Document.

Figure 1 below illustrates the distribution of total hospital points out of 10. The average points scored for the Mid-Year Scorecards was 5.9/10 before including the survey bonus points. This is 0.9 points higher than the average points scored at the conclusion of PY21 excluding all bonus points.

Figure 1.

Figure 2 below illustrates the breakdown of average points by condition out of five. Consistent with previous years, joint replacement was the highest scoring condition with an average of 4.5 points earned. The success of the joint replacement condition can be attributed to the shift from post-acute care in skilled nursing facilities (SNF) to home health and the move towards outpatient surgeries. Pneumonia was the lowest scoring condition with hospitals earning less than one point on average. The MVC average payment for a 30-day pneumonia episode increased by $792 from the baseline in 2019 to the performance year in 2021. The largest contributors to this increase were the base payment and readmission payments.

Figure 2.

The Mid-Year P4P scores are subject to change as new data is added. The final scorecards will be distributed after all 2021 claims have been added to the data in quarter one of 2023. Hospitals can track their score through the new P4P PY2022-2023 reports on the MVC registry. These new reports provide all relevant scoring information for both improvement and achievement points in one place except for the survey bonus points. They can be filtered by selected conditions to make the tracking of P4P points easier. For a walkthrough of your hospital’s Mid-Year P4P Scorecard or P4P registry reports, please contact the MVC Coordinating Center.

25 Aug 2022
0
View Post
BCBSM Initiative Incentivizes Data Collection on Social Factors

BCBSM Initiative Incentivizes Data Collection on Social Factors

August 25, 2022 | 0 Comments | , , ,

Health equity is a top priority for providers across the country, who are keenly aware of the prevalence and exacerbation of existing health inequities. The state of Michigan in particular ranks poorly in measures of population health and social determinants of health (SDOH), which represent a huge opportunity to improve equity and health outcomes for patients. Health equity is currently a key strategic focus of the Michigan Value Collaborative (MVC) Coordinating Center in the years ahead, as well as for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan (BCBSM). As work in this area grows, some suggest that better data collection is the next critical step to improving health equity.

Data collection is the focus of BCBSM’s latest initiative - the SDOH Standardized Data Collection and Aggregation Initiative - which offers incentives to physician organizations (POs) for collecting and submitting SDOH screening data. Its goal is to increase SDOH screening by primary care physicians during annual wellness visits as well as enhance SDOH data submitted to the Michigan Health Information Network (MiHIN), Michigan's nonprofit statewide health information network.

This data will be used in the short term to improve data conformance and SDOH definitions within the Michigan provider community. Ideally, this initiative will help BCBSM to improve care coordination between providers, identify gaps in resources and community-level social need trends, and provide analytics and reporting to the provider community. The long-term goal is to reduce disparities and improve health outcomes.

There are multiple pathways for POs to participate, primarily by either submitting screening data through MiHIN’s SDOH use case, or by developing infrastructure to enable participation in MiHIN’s SDOH use case. BCBSM sees this incentive program as an important step toward ensuring all patients receive the care they need.

“The SDOH initiative is valuable for both patients and providers because it encourages providers to screen for SDOH needs in patients and also encourages that the data from these screenings is exchanged in an interoperable way,” said Karolina Skrzypek, MD, Medical Director of Clinical Partnerships at BCBSM. “It is very important that providers across the state of Michigan have the ability to access SDOH screening data regardless of where the screening took place. Screening for SDOH needs by providers is the first step in helping to address these needs in our patients.”

These points were echoed by Martha M. Walsh, MD, MHSA, FACOG, Medical Director of Clinical Partnerships and Engagement at BCBSM, who said, “We know that when patients have SDOH needs, that it is more difficult for them to have their healthcare needs met and for patients to care for their chronic conditions. Our initial goal in having providers screen for SDOH needs is for patients to have their needs addressed at the point of care.”

Some POs are already actively submitting this data to MiHIN and can receive incentive payments for continuing to do so. The other pathways are focused on those who have capacity to store and extract SDOH data but are not submitting it to MiHIN, or those POs who don’t yet have the digital infrastructure in place. Helping all POs to achieve a similar capacity and submit their data to the same vendor will allow for a broader understanding of the gaps and communities in need of further funding.

“By aggregating this data, we hope to learn more about specific domains of need and geographic areas with the most needs so that we can start to address these more broadly,” said Dr. Walsh. “We hope that by screening for and addressing SDOH needs, we will start to be able to decrease disparities in care for our most vulnerable patients.”

Incentives for the MiHIN SDOH use case pathways are paid out of the BCBSM Physician Group Incentive Program (PGIP) reward pool. Therefore, any deadlines related to participation are based on PGIP payment cycles. Those POs wishing to participate in the October 2022 cycle should submit their opt-in form and any other required materials by the end of August.

A separate value-based reimbursement (VBR) reward was created specifically for patient-centered medical home (PCMH) designated primary care physicians for completing SDOH screenings using Z codes. This VBR payment was available when the SDOH initiative launched in January. Provider offices had six months to work towards meeting the criteria to receive VBR effective 9/1/2022. Criteria for the 2023 cycle was previously announced and updates to the criteria will be provided during the upcoming BCBSM September PGIP quarterly meeting.

Any POs or providers interested in learning more about this initiative and the pathways for participating can read the full brochure here and submit questions directly to BCBSM at POPrograms@bcbsm.com. In addition, if your PO or hospital has success stories or insights that have resulted from collecting SDOH screening data, please consider sharing your story and insights with the MVC Coordinating Center at michiganvaluecollaborative@gmail.com.

Support for MVC is provided by Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan as part of the BCBSM Value Partnerships program. Although BCBSM and MVC work collaboratively, the opinions, beliefs, and viewpoints expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs, and viewpoints of BCBSM or any of its employees. To learn more about the Value Partnerships program, visit www.valuepartnerships.com.

04 Aug 2022
0

MVC Launches New Push Report on ED and Post-Acute Care Use

August 4, 2022 | 0 Comments | , , ,

The emergency department (ED) is a unique and critical component of the healthcare system in the U.S., treating acute injuries or illnesses and acting as a safety net for patients who are uninsured or low income. ED visits are also very expensive, and that spending is growing according to a recent retrospective study of ED trends. This week the Michigan Value Collaborative (MVC) is distributing its newest push report on ED and post-acute care (PAC) utilization to support members' efforts in this space.

Since the ED serves as a safety net for patients experiencing barriers to healthcare access, the Coordinating Center report purposefully integrates measures tied to social determinants of health and health equity. Reports contain a patient population snapshot table showcasing several patient characteristics by payer (see Figure 1), including age, race, comorbidities, zip code, dual-eligibility status, and economic distress scores. Dual-eligible patients are those who qualify for both Medicaid and Medicare; these patients tend to have a higher prevalence rate for chronic conditions, disabilities, and other care needs that substantially increase healthcare utilization.

Figure 1.

Economic distress scores range from 0-100 with a higher score indicating greater economic distress. These scores come from the Economic Innovation Group’s Distressed Communities Index (DCI), which is derived from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Business Patterns and American Community Survey. The DCI combines seven complementary economic indicators (see Figure 2) to provide a single, holistic, and comparative measure of economic well-being across communities in the U.S. In MVC’s report, there is a proportion of patients living in an “at-risk” or “distressed” zip code across all payers, as classified by the DCI. However, as the literature often indicates, the Medicaid population has the highest average distress score and a larger proportion of patients living in an “at-risk” or “distressed” zip code.

Figure 2.

The bulk of MVC’s latest report aims to provide its members with more granular insights into PAC utilization in the 30-day post-discharge period than is available on the MVC registry. Using index admissions for medical conditions from 1/1/18 through 12/31/20, the report focuses predominantly on ED utilization, which is categorized as either “ED to Home” or “ED to Readmission.” ED to Home represents ED visits that do not occur on the same day as readmission, and ED to Readmission refers to those visits occurring on the same day as readmission.

The report includes figures illustrating trends in 30-day ED to Home rates between 2018 and 2020, top reasons for ED visits at a given hospital, the number of ED to Home visits within 30 days post-discharge, the number of days until the first ED visit post-discharge, the ED to Home rate and the breakdown of total PAC spending for a hospital’s three highest-volume conditions, and the average ED facility payment. MVC included the following payers in this report: Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan (BCBSM) PPO Commercial, BCBSM Medicare Advantage (MA), Blue Care Network (BCN) HMO Commercial, BCN MA, Medicare Fee-for-Service, and Medicaid.

Overall, the MVC report confirms published findings that Medicaid patients utilize the ED at a higher rate than patients insured by other payers. The Coordinating Center also finds that ED use differs between types of providers. For acute care hospitals, for example, over half of ED visits occur on the same day as readmission, whereas these visits account for 40% at Critical Access Hospitals (CAHs).

MVC also finds that ED to Home visits most often occur once in the 30 days following discharge for most of the collaborative (see Figure 3). There are some members, however, with three or more ED to Home visits within the 30-day post-discharge period.

Figure 3.

The Coordinating Center envisions this report being of particular importance to its CAH members, whose structures, services, and patient populations make the ED and PAC a top priority. As such, MVC prepared versions of this report for both CAHs and acute care hospitals using their respective comparison groups throughout. In other words, the CAH version of the report includes comparison points for all other CAHs in the collaborative. Acute care hospitals can see their traditional collaborative-wide and regional comparison data, not including hospitals with a CAH designation.

As members review and discuss the findings in their report(s), MVC encourages providers to utilize the Michigan Emergency Department Improvement Collaborative (MEDIC), which is dedicated to improving the quality of ED care across the state of Michigan. In addition, if members wish to discuss additional custom analyses on ED and PAC utilization, please contact the MVC Coordinating Center at michiganvaluecollaborative@gmail.com.

28 Jul 2022
0
View Post
Latest MVC Preop Testing Report Features New Figures and Data

Latest MVC Preop Testing Report Features New Figures and Data

July 28, 2022 | 0 Comments | ,

This week MVC distributed its second preoperative testing push report of 2022, providing members with another opportunity to benchmark their testing practices. MVC first introduced its preoperative testing push reports in 2021 to help members reduce the use of unnecessary testing for surgical procedures. Preoperative testing, especially for low-risk surgeries, often provides no clinical benefits to patients but is ordered regularly at hospitals across Michigan.

The report distributed this week had many similarities to the version distributed earlier this year in April, namely that members continued to see their rates across a variety of tests for three elective, low-risk procedures performed in outpatient settings: laparoscopic cholecystectomy, laparoscopic inguinal hernia repair, and lumpectomy. Claims were evaluated for the index event as well as 30 days prior to the procedures for the following common tests: electrocardiogram (ECGs), echocardiogram, cardiac stress test, complete blood count, basic metabolic panel, coagulation studies, urinalysis, chest x-ray, and pulmonary function.

The latest report has a few key differences from the spring version, the most significant of which is that it utilizes claims from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan (BCBSM) and Blue Care Network (BCN) plans exclusively. This allows members to see MVC’s most up-to-date data; the report includes index admissions from 1/1/2019 through 12/31/2021. In addition, since the report contains BCBSM/BCN data only, there is no case count suppression, whereas members would only see their data in the spring version if they had at least 11 cases in each year of data for the three combined conditions.

The reports received by members this week included several new figures. Similar to other MVC push reports, members will now see a patient snapshot table that provides additional information about the report’s patient population. For this, MVC chose to include patient characteristics such as age, zip code, and comorbidities. Generally speaking, there were more comorbidities among patients who underwent preoperative testing compared to patients with one or no comorbidities (see Figure 1). However, the majority of patients who complete a preoperative test do not have multiple comorbidities. There were also observed differences in testing rates by age. In general, patients who had preoperative testing were older on average than patients who had no preoperative testing.

Figure 1.

Another new figure showcased the overall preoperative testing rates by year. This trend graph showed members how their overall rate for any preoperative testing compared in 2019, 2020, and 2021, and it included data points for the MVC average and regional comparison groups (see Figure 2). The key finding for this figure was that there has been very little change in testing rates over time when looking at overall preoperative testing practices. This means that, in general, the prevalence of low-value preoperative testing has remained consistently high overall across the collaborative for three years and likely longer.

Figure 2.

The latest report also included a new figure for absolute change in any preoperative testing from 2019 to 2021. For each hospital, this appears as a caterpillar plot of absolute change percentages for their highest-volume procedure among the three low-risk surgeries in the report. Members can see the percentage change—positive or negative—in their testing rate for that surgical condition, as well as how their absolute change compares to the rest of the collaborative. For example, hospitals that perform more cholecystectomies than hernia repairs or lumpectomies saw a wide range of both increases and decreases in preoperative testing rates from 2019 to 2021 (see Figure 3).

Figure 3.

The blinded hospital in this example observed very little change in its testing rate for cholecystectomy (-1.6%), and the MVC average was similar (-2.2%). This showcases that although the collaborative is not seeing much change to overall rates for any testing over time, individual members might see greater variability over time for specific tests or procedures, especially in instances of low case counts.

Members will be able to take those deeper dives into their rates for specific tests in the figures that make up the remaining pages of the report. Viewing one’s preoperative testing rates for each specific test can help members understand if any specific tests are driving their overall testing rate. One area of opportunity, for example, could be to reduce one's rate of cardiac testing, specifically ECGs; the rate of ECGs is very variable across the collaborative (see Figure 4) and could lead to a cascade of care.

Figure 4.

MVC is eager to drive improvement in this area. For more information on how MVC is working to reduce unnecessary preoperative testing, visit its Value Coalition Campaign webpage here. If you are interested in a more customized report or would like information about MVC’s preop testing stakeholder working group, please contact the MVC Coordinating Center at michiganvaluecollaborative@gmail.com.

14 Jul 2022
0

Reflecting on MVC’s Accomplishments: January-June 2022

July 14, 2022 | 0 Comments

As we start the second half of 2022, the MVC Coordinating Center is taking a moment to pause and reflect on the tremendous work that has been accomplished over the past six months. Here is a look back at some of the highlights.

JANUARY

MVC Workgroups consist of a diverse group of representatives from Michigan hospitals and POs that meet virtually to collaborate and share ideas related to various topics. January kicked off with the launch of MVC’s new Health Equity Workgroup! The inaugural meeting featured speakers from the Michigan Social Health Interventions to Eliminate Disparities (MSHIELD) Collaborative. The Health Equity Workgroup has two more meetings in 2022 and we’d love to see you there! Visit the MVC 2022 Events Calendar to register and check the calendar for additional Workgroup offerings focused on Chronic Disease Management, Diabetes, Health in Action, Joint Replacement, and Sepsis.

FEBRUARY

MVC launched two new push reports in February, with the release of the new Physician Organization (PO) Colectomy Report, shared with 35 of MVC’s PO members, and the first-ever Pneumonia Push Report, distributed to 89 MVC hospital members[1]. To meet the needs of MVC’s growing hospital members, a subset of the Pneumonia Push Reports was tailored to meet the specific data needs of our Critical Access Hospital members.

MARCH

After completing 58 hospital site visits in 2021, MVC announced the creation of a robust quality improvement (QI) initiatives database, developed to track QI initiatives across the collaborative. The database, searchable by QI focus area and project status, allows MVC to understand common themes and challenges among all its members as well as within subgroups such as hospital size or region. In 2022, the MVC team is hosting site visits with our PO members and will be gathering QI initiatives to add to the QI initiatives database. The database is being used as a resource for custom analytic requests and a library of practice standards for members. If you are an MVC PO interested in participating in a virtual site visit, please contact the MVC Coordinating Center to schedule.

APRIL

In April, MVC distributed a refreshed Sepsis Push Report, developed in collaboration with the Michigan Hospital Medicine Safety Consortium. These customized reports provide hospitals with new insight on demographics for their sepsis patients, including the percentage of COVID-positive patients to illustrate how COVID has impacted their sepsis data, along with race, top comorbidities, and most common zip codes, stratified by payer.

MAY

MVC held its first collaborative-wide meeting of 2022 in May, with a focus on “Turning Data into Action.” Held virtually, a total of 158 leaders representing 68 different hospitals and 15 physician organizations (POs) from across the state of Michigan participated in the event. Save the Date for our next in-person collaborative-wide meeting, scheduled for Friday, October 28th at the Radisson Hotel Lansing!

JUNE

In June, the MVC Coordinating Center hosted its first in-person event since 2019, with a Regional Networking Dinner for our Eastern Michigan sites (Region 3). The dinner provided an opportunity for MVC hospital and PO members to come together to network, share ideas and discuss key priorities, including health equity initiatives. MVC’s next Regional Networking Event for Southeast Michigan (Region 4) is scheduled for Tuesday, September 27th. For identification of your MVC designated region, please see the MVC Regions Map here.

AND COMING SOON…

Along the way, the MVC team has been hard at work preparing for two new exciting developments:

  • MVC’s first Northern Summer Meeting (RSVP here) is scheduled for Thursday, August 18th at Traverse City’s Great Wolf Lodge. The agenda is tailored to highlight unique opportunities and challenges facing the Northern Michigan healthcare community. Interested MVC members serving Northern Michigan, the Upper Peninsula, and small/rural communities are encouraged to The University of Michigan Medical School designates this live activity for a maximum of 3.75 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)™.  This meeting will feature presentations from:
    • Michigan Center for Rural Health
    • MyMichigan Medical Center – Sault
    • Munson Healthcare Grayling Hospital
    • Region 9 Area Agency on Aging

To learn more about these initiatives and other MVC happenings, visit the MVC blog!

Footnote

[1] Hospitals and POs not meeting case count thresholds did not receive a report.

07 Jul 2022
0
View Post
MVC Coordinating Center Team Volunteers at Member Hospital

MVC Coordinating Center Team Volunteers at Member Hospital

July 7, 2022 | 0 Comments

As employers and managers endeavor to invest in their company’s culture, there is one often overlooked activity that can positively impact job satisfaction: volunteering. According to a study from Deloitte, cultivating a culture that encourages volunteerism can boost employee morale, workplace atmosphere, and brand perception. It found that 89% of employees believe companies with sponsored volunteer activities offer a better overall work environment and that 70% felt volunteering was a stronger boost to morale than company-sponsored happy hours. Since team culture and the retention of skilled employees have become increasingly important in the current job market, there has never been a better time to help staff feel connected to their community and teammates.

The Michigan Value Collaborative (MVC) experienced some of these benefits recently when the Coordinating Center team spent several hours volunteering together at a local MVC member hospital. This was the first time MVC had organized an official service day for its team. It took place at the Farm at Trinity Health, located at the Trinity Health St. Joseph Mercy Ann Arbor Hospital in Ypsilanti, MI. The MVC team spent several hours weeding, planting, and harvesting vegetables. After harvesting, the MVC team helped wash and pack fresh greens, salad mix, kale, and radishes for the Farm’s community-supported agriculture (CSA) program and patient produce boxes.

Selecting the Farm at Trinity Health as MVC’s service day location was an exciting opportunity due to its many connections to MVC’s priorities. The produce boxes distributed by the Farm help feed members of the community who experience food insecurity or hunger, as well as hospital patients who participate in programs like cardiac rehabilitation (CR). MVC has identified health equity as a strategic priority for 2022 and beyond, and also currently has a Value Coalition Campaign that encourages members to increase patient utilization of CR programs. The MVC team was excited to learn about this direct connection to CR patients and the program’s overall impact on community health. In addition, the Farm at Trinity Health is a participating site in the Washtenaw County Health Department’s Prescription for Health Program, which was a featured topic at MVC’s health equity workgroup earlier this year.

This service day also coincided with an overall shift in how MVC staff members interact. As MVC grew over the past two years, multiple new employees had only ever interacted with coworkers virtually because of the pandemic’s impact on in-person activities. That changed this past spring with MVC’s part-time return to in-person work and some in-person team-building events. The service day was intended to bring teammates together after many months apart to get to know one another, connect, and give back to the wider community.

If you have a story about an impactful program that could be shared with the Collaborative or wish to connect your team with local community volunteering, contact the MVC Coordinating Center for assistance at michiganvaluecollaborative@gmail.com. Learn more about the Farm at Trinity Health (formerly the Farm at St. Joe’s) here.

23 Jun 2022
0
View Post
MVC Registry to Soon Include Patient-Level Medicare Data

MVC Registry to Soon Include Patient-Level Medicare Data

June 23, 2022 | 0 Comments | ,

In the coming weeks, MVC registry users will receive communications outlining several required steps related to implementing the Coordinating Center’s new data use agreement (DUA) as a qualified entity (QE) with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). The QE DUA permits MVC to display Medicare Fee-For-Service (FFS) claims data with fewer data suppression limitations than its research DUA within its online registry. As a result, authorized users of the MVC registry may gain access to identifiable Medicare beneficiary data.

These changes are the result of years of work by the MVC team to earn its QE status through the Qualified Entity Certification Program (QECP), which is also known as the Medicare Data Sharing for Performance Measurement Program. The QE application includes multiple phases before an entity is permitted to show patient-level data. The MVC Coordinating Center has been working through the final phase (see Figure 1) of the application, which involves developing and documenting measures for public reporting.

Figure 1.

The QE Medicare data will be contained in a separate tab on the MVC registry. Authorized users will have access to both the existing Medicare FFS reports as well as the QE reports. The QE data will be available for the most recent 18 months of index admissions only and will not have any case count suppression, allowing users to see the more granular data that is censored in the Medicare FFS reports.

The QE reports also have additional patient population filters to view the data by patient comorbidities, patient age, and more granular date options. These reports also feature trend graphs that can be viewed monthly, quarterly, or annually. In addition to uncensored data, the QE data will allow for patient-level drill-down as is currently available in the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan data. The drill-down includes detailed information on the patient’s comorbidities, price standardized episode payments, and claim level walk-through. Although patient drill-down is available, the provider identifiers have been removed in conjunction with the QECP regulations. Additionally, the skilled nursing facility report is not available in the QE reports to avoid identifying providers.

For those with access, the QE reports should be used when evaluating the most recent years of data. The Medicare FFS reports can still be useful for historical trends and the Coordinating Center may be able to provide custom reports to fill in information that isn’t available through the registry. The patient-level drill-down can be used in conjunction with a hospital’s clinical information to understand what led to high-cost patients. The QE data should make Medicare data more useful to hospital members. However, QE data is only to be used for quality improvement rather than for marketing purposes. Additionally, authorized users are prohibited from disclosing or redistributing data provided in these reports outside of their institution.

Next week MVC member hospitals will receive a new QE DUA to be reviewed and signed by an authorized representative from their institution. This signed DUA is a prerequisite for receiving access to the new QE pages once they are available. MVC’s current CMS research DUA will remain in effect on non-QE registry pages and will continue to utilize data suppression for fewer than 11 episodes to protect patient identities. The MVC registry will also implement multifactor authentication (MFA) upon login for all registry users regardless of QE access in order to comply with the new DUA's security and data privacy requirements.

In the coming weeks, MVC members and registry users are encouraged to be attentive to any communications containing additional details or requests. In the meantime, please contact the MVC Coordinating Center with any immediate questions at michiganvaluecollaborative@gmail.com.

16 Jun 2022
0
View Post
New MVC Northern Summer Meeting Planned for August

New MVC Northern Summer Meeting Planned for August

June 16, 2022 | 0 Comments | , ,

MVC will launch a new in-person event this summer when it hosts members and speakers from Northern Michigan. This new MVC Northern Summer Meeting is modeled after the collaborative-wide semi-annual meetings, but it aims to focus on unique challenges and opportunities in delivering healthcare in this part of the state. The event will take place on August 18, 2022, from 12-5 p.m. at the Great Wolf Lodge in Traverse City, MI.

As MVC has gained new members, it has also diversified with the addition of more rural and critical access hospitals. These types of sites – many of which are located in the upper peninsula or northern half of the lower peninsula – play an integral role in the health system and have a unique care delivery experience. According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), these types of hospitals have higher performance quality measures than their urban counterparts for areas such as safety, community engagement, efficiency, and cost reduction. At the same time, however, they also face unique challenges related to low patient volumes, higher rates of chronic disease, insufficient workforce recruitment and retention, and low reimbursement rates, among others.

It is these unique strengths and challenges that will be the focus of the day’s agenda, which will include speakers representing area hospitals, rural health organizations, community agencies, and the MVC Coordinating Center. The event’s keynote speaker will be Crystal Barter, MSA, Director of Programs and Services for the Michigan Center for Rural Health. Her presentation on “Michigan’s Rural Health Landscape: Challenges and Opportunities” will set the stage for the afternoon and be followed by speakers on specific topics, such as Hospital at Home care models and the aging population.

The other speakers include Stephanie Pins, MSA, Director of Quality Management, Risk, and Compliance, and Kristine Boyer, MSN, RN, Clinical Quality Manager, of MyMichigan Medical Center - Sault; Dr. Aditya Neravetla, MD, Chief Medical Officer at Munson Healthcare Grayling Hospital; and Jenna Lindholm, RN, CCM, Clinical Quality Supervisor at the Region 9 Area Agency on Aging.

The MVC Coordinating Center will also provide its latest updates as well as unblinded data to encourage member collaboration. The event includes dedicated networking sessions at the start and end of the day’s agenda when members can compare notes and glean ideas from peers.

MVC distributed invitations to northern members at the beginning of June and plans to share the full agenda with additional event specifics in the coming weeks. Those members who received invitations are encouraged to RSVP now.

If you have any questions about the upcoming event, contact the MVC Coordinating Center at michiganvaluecollaborative@gmail.com.