- No. 56: “Vital Signs for Community Acquired Pneumonia”;
- No. 57: “Oxygenation Assessment for Community Acquired Pneumonia”;
- No. 58: “Assessment of Mental Status for Community Acquired Pneumonia”; and
- No. 59: “Empiric Antibiotic for Community Acquired Pneumonia.”
These measures harmonize with the Joint Commission’s core measures and are relevant for hospitalist performance reporting.
With the NQF
On Sept. 26-28, PSC member Greg Seymann represented SHM at NQF’s 8th Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. This meeting featured plenary sessions focusing on issues at the forefront of policy discussions related to quality of care including:
- Chronic care episodes across care settings;
- Medications and quality;
- Medicare performance monitoring and payment initiatives;
- Moving performance measures into electronic health record requirements; and
- Nursing leadership in measurement activities and achieving higher performance.
- In the first quarter of 2008, the PSC has:
- Reviewed and commented on NQF’s “National Voluntary Consensus Standards for Hospital Care: Additional Priorities–2007, Part 2”;
- Sent a representative to the steering committee for the National Voluntary Consensus Clinician-Level Perioperative Care Standards meeting;
- Submitted nominees for the National Voluntary Consensus Standards for Emergency Care Phase II steering committee and the Prevention and Management of Stroke Across the Continuum steering committee (our nominee was accepted for the latter);
- Reviewed and commented on the National Voluntary Consensus Standards for Prevention and
- Care of Venous Thromboembolism: Performance Measures/Phase II; and;
- Has sent senior leadership and staff to the NQF Spring Meeting and Implementation Conference on Care Coordination.
In the Works
The PSC and the HQPSC submitted a comment letter on CMS’ selection of hospital-acquired conditions and present on admission indicator reporting for 2009. SHM supported CMS’ efforts to improve the quality of care for hospitalized patients by preventing avoidable hospital-acquired conditions and outlining its concerns regarding unintended consequences as relates to the various conditions.
With its new status as the PSC, this enthusiastic and committed group is preparing to extend its mission and scope of work in 2008.
The PSC plans to restructure and serve as expert liaisons for internal and external activities. This not only will empower committee members to become more engaged in our performance agenda, but also allow them to serve as key contacts for staff when monitoring the ever-growing landscape of performance measurement, quality, and policy. TH