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But is healthcare something that can really be shopped for like other industries? What factors are patients most interested in when making decisions? How are payers and providers responding? What will it mean for healthcare costs?
Learn more at a Wisconsin Health News Panel Event, Tuesday, Oct. 4 at the Milwaukee Athletic Club.
Panelists include:
APPLETON – The federal government has released ratings of hospitals nationwide, but Wisconsin health care leaders say the numbers don’t necessarily add up.
The new Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) ratings by the federal Department of Health and Human Services evaluate 64 quality measures up to five stars. Those measures address everything from patient satisfaction and mortality rates for common ailments that land patients in hospitals to infection rates for different types of procedures.
But are these measures helpful to consumers and patients in the Fox Valley? Buyer beware, hospital and physician groups say.
“I do think this is a good first step, but there are some real flaws,” said Donn Dexter, chief medical officer of the Wisconsin Medical Society, a physician advocacy group. “The playing field is null and equal, and the measurements aren’t always applied equally to all hospitals.”
In the Fox Valley, almost all of the hospitals received three-star or four-star ratings. St. Elizabeth Hospital in Appleton, Aurora Medical Center and Mercy Medical Center in Oshkosh, were four-star hospitals in the southern part of the Fox Valley. In the Green Bay area, Bellin Memorial Hospital and Aurora Baycare Medical Center also had four stars.
All seven medical centers affiliated with Appleton-based ThedaCare received three-star ratings. The seven medical centers are in Appleton, Berlin, Neenah, New London, Shawano, Waupaca and Wild Rose.
ThedaCare is supportive of ratings like these being publicly available, said CEO Dean Gruner in a statement to USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin, citing other rankings from Wisconsin Collaborative for Healthcare Quality and the Wisconsin Health Information Organization.
“The CMS star rating is new and we will learn as we go,” he said. “We always use feedback to help us further improve the great work of our team members.”
Dexter said it’s important to be wary of the rankings though, depending on whether the information is from patients’ opinions or the medical center has a smaller number of patients.
“If your patient comes in and wants narcotics for pain, and you don’t give them narcotics because while it’s easy, it’s not appropriate and because you want to prevent them from being addicted, you can get a very adverse rating (for patient satisfaction),” Dexter said. “Even though, you did the right thing.”
Robert Batt, a University of Wisconsin-Madison business professor, said he liked how CMS included reporting from patients.
“Surveys tend to have people with extreme opinions, but even at that, it’s real data of real patients who were there and who can say something,” he said.
Hospitals could also have higher infection rates according to the CMS data after certain surgeries or ailments, for example, but only because they had one patient who received that surgery and subsequently got an infection, Dexter said.
A smaller rural hospital, often referred to as critical access hospitals, will also likely rank lower than a large hospital with research capabilities, like UW Health in Madison or Froedert in Milwaukee, he said.
“It’s just not the same thing and we have to understand that,” Dexter said. “Interpreting these rankings with a little skill takes time.”
Patients with chronic illnesses or conditions should not just evaluate the general measures, but look at specific measures for their condition, said Patrick Falvey, chief transformation officer at Aurora Health Care.
If a patient has heart issues, they should dive deeply into measures related to cardiovascular health, for example, Falvey said. But, if hospitals perform well overall on the general measures, hospitals likely have a “solid foundation” of medical practice.
Beyond individual hospitals, Wisconsin as a whole has higher rated hospitals than its counterparts nationwide. All but three hospitals statewide scored at least three stars or higher.
Officials with the Wisconsin Hospital Association said the group is happy that Wisconsin scored well on the ratings. Dexter had similar sentiments, saying Wisconsin is in a much better place overall compared to other states.
“However, we are concerned that the large number of different hospital ratings that exist and the complexity of how these ratings are calculated can cause confusion for health care consumers,” said Kelly Court, Wisconsin Hospital Association’s chief quality officer, in a statement to USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin. “Hospitals are working hard to improve the quality of the most important services they provide, which may or may not be reflected in this new rating.”
Northeast Wisconsin CMS hospital ratings
Madeleine Behr: 920-996-7226, or mbehr@postcrescent.com; on Twitter @madeleinebehr
Read article here.
As patients take on an increasing share of their healthcare costs, they are becoming more engaged consumers. The shift is likely to transform how healthcare is delivered and how providers and payers communicate with their members.
But is healthcare something that can really be shopped for like other industries? What factors are patients most interested in when making decisions? How are payers and providers responding? What will it mean for healthcare costs?
Learn more at a Wisconsin Health News Panel Event, Tuesday, Oct. 4 at the Milwaukee Athletic Club.
Panelists:
Wisconsin Health Information Organization
The Wisconsin Health Information Organization (WHIO) has named Dana Richardson its new CEO. Richardson succeeds Josephine Musser who is retiring.
Richardson has been serving since April as Acting Executive Director of the non-profit PCPI® Foundation in Chicago. Previously, she served six years at the American Medical Association (AMA) as Director of Operations and Strategic Initiatives for the PCPI, which was originally convened by the AMA. From 2002-2010, Richardson was Vice President for Quality Initiatives at the Wisconsin Hospital Association (WHA).
With a BS in Nursing and an MA Business, Health Service Administration from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and prior experience at St. Mary’s Hospital in Madison and the Dean Health System, Richardson has deep ties to Wisconsin’s health care system, as both a provider and administrator, beginning in 1983.
“Dana Richardson is a proven leader who thinks strategically and acts decisively, setting goals, solving problems and seeing tangible results,” said WHIO Board Chair Linda Syth. “Her background in quality and efficiency at the local and state level in Wisconsin, along with her work at the national level with physician societies and performance measurement, make her uniquely qualified to engage caregivers where their heart is – great patient care. We’re delighted to welcome Dana to WHIO,” Syth said.
WHIO provides health care information to consumers, clinicians, providers, employers and payers to support decision-making. “I am excited to be joining an organization focused on the quality, safety and affordability of health care. Knowing that Wisconsin is a high value state for health care services, my goal is to further leverage the WHIO information to set a higher bar,” said Richardson.
Richardson will assume her new post on August 30th and collaborate with outgoing CEO Jo Musser until the end of the year to ensure a smooth transition.
The Wisconsin Health Information Organization (WHIO) is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to improving the quality, affordability, safety and efficiency of health care in Wisconsin.
Eighty years ago, Milwaukee was the healthiest city in the country. Now, it’s among the unhealthiest in the state. What happened?
Join Mayor Tom Barrett and Commissioner of Health Bevan Baker on Sept. 6 for a wide-ranging discussion on the state of health of Wisconsin’s largest city, and how it impacts the rest of the state. They’ll outline what city officials and other leaders are doing to decrease disparities and reduce infant mortality rates, and examine why these rates, and others, including obesity, are higher in Milwaukee.
Wisconsin Health News Editor Tim Stumm will moderate this Newsmaker Event on Sept. 6 in Milwaukee at the Milwaukee Athletic Club.
July 6, Wisconsin Health News
Declining Medicaid enrollment has led the Department of Health Services to predict the state will end the 2015-’17 biennium below budget for the program, according to a report released last week.
The projection suggests that general purpose revenue expenditures will be 3 percent below budgeted levels for the biennium. That’s in part due to a decline in Medicaid enrollment, which dropped by more than 6,000 between March and May.
Other factors playing a role in the projection include slower growth in prescription drug expenditures, higher drug rebate revenues and less growth in personal care and home health services.
“These positive trends in enrollment and service utilization indicate good things about ongoing improvements in the state’s economy and the department’s efforts to control Medicaid costs through better coordination, improved managed care rate setting methodologies, and fraud and abuse prevention efforts,” Tom Engels, interim DHS secretary, wrote in a letter to lawmakers on the Joint Finance Committee.
Engels stressed that the margin could be “easily reversed” if enrollment, provider claims or other factors turn out “slightly less favorable than assumed.”
Wisconsin Health News is hosting a daylong conference on July 28th focusing on the future of healthcare.
National and state health leaders will analyze the trends, policies and innovations shaping the state’s changing healthcare landscape. Panelists will discuss the growing prevalence of partnerships, the intersection of healthcare and community population health, the impact of data and more.
For additional conference information, click here.
