Scores Predict Readmission Likelihood

Through a simple risk score, a team from Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, collaborating with a team in Bern, Switzerland, say they can identify roughly one-fourth of a hospital's patient population with the highest likelihood of being readmitted, and then within that group the 18% whose readmissions were potentially avoidable, for whom more expensive, intensive efforts might be worth the money.  Continue reading the article.

Readmissions is an area of interest to INQRI.  Grantees Dr. Marianne Weiss and Dr. Olga Yakusheva have conducted research on the discharge process and it's relationship to readmissions.  Learn more about their work:

View "Nurse and patient perceptions of discharge readiness in relation to postdischarge utilization."
View "Age-related differences in perception of quality of discharge teaching and readiness for hospital discharge."
View "Quality and cost analysis of nurse staffing, discharge preparation, and postdischarge utilization."

Ohio Medicaid Program Incentivizes High Quality Care For Nursing Homes

Starting last month, Ohio' Medicaid program altered its payment procedures to reflect the current trend of moving slowly away from a fee-for-service scheme to adapt to pay-for-performance reimbursement schemes. Ohio's new payment policy links approximately 10% of all Medicaid reimbursements for nursing homes to a wide range of quality measures including, patient satisfaction, rate of errors and nurse staffing levels.

To read more about this initiative, head over to Kaiser Health News for a more thorough explanation of this, and similar programs.

Report: Higher Payments Are No Cure For Doctor Shortage

Earlier this week, Jordan Rau, reporting for Kaiser Health News, detailed a recent report by the Institute of Medicine that recommended that Medicare should not raise reimbursements to lure practitioners to rural areas. The panel of experts suggested that instead of raising reimbursements, Medicare should provide payment for the use of telemedicine, in addition to supporting the expansion of scope of practice laws in restrictive states. By promoting the use of advanced practice nurses, the IOM believes it is possible to close the primary care physician gap using the existing workforce and network of resources currently available.

To read more about the report, click here.

Study Shows That Nursing Home Medicaid Recipients Have Higher Hospitalization Rates

In a recently published study in the journal, Medical Care Research and Review, Helena Temkin-Greener, PhD, MPH, and her colleagues found that nursing homes may be enticed to send Medicaid recipients to the hospital for care due to financial incentives. The study identified that Medicaid reimbursement for hospitalizations are almost half that of Medicare reimbursements and as a result, may motivate decisions when determining if a patient needs to be transferred to a higher level of care.

Click here to read the full news article.

Click here to access the study (subscription may be required).