CMS Announces Results of First OPPS Data Report

More than 3,000 hospitals qualified for the full 2009 payment update for participating in CMS new Hospital Outpatient Quality Data Reporting Program, according to a CMS press release.

Only 26 of the country’s 3,339 eligible hospitals that participated in the program did not receive the full update, a 99.3 percent success rate. Eighteen did not correctly report the quality data, while eight lacked a QualityNet Administrator, the secure CMS software program and website that allows hospitals and health providers to report quality data to CMS.

“The reporting program represents another major step toward value-based purchasing of health care services to ensure that patients with Medicare and the American taxpayers get the best outcomes for their health care dollars,” said CMS Acting Administrator Kerry Weems in the press release.

The 2006 Tax Relief and Health Care Act required all U.S. hospitals paid under Medicare’s outpatient prospective payment system (OPPS) to participate in the quality data reporting program to receive the full market basket update, with some exceptions.

The 26 hospitals that did not qualify received a payment update 2 percent smaller
Hospitals were required to report data on seven quality measures defining quality of care in heart attack and surgery care, including percentage of heart attack patients given aspirin upon arrival in the ER and percentage of surgery patients who receive prophylactic antibiotics an hour before surgery.

The final OPPS rule for 2009 adds four imaging measures for hospitals to obtain the full update in 2010.

Read the CMS press release on the hospital quality reporting results.