About ten days ago, I wrote a piece regarding the negative impacts providers can expect (and receive) when quality of care and service combined with vigilance on compliance are not primary in and across their organizations. All too often, I hear companies and organizations that I work with, say they are committed to quality but by deeds, the evidence is lacking. In fact, I have never heard a failed organization say that they weren’t (always) committed to quality patient care, etc. I have also never heard a failing organization or poorly rated one say that “while we will talk about quality, that’s all we do – talk”. No organization ever says that quality is “lip service more than substance” just like no restaurant ever says their food is “marginal or poor”. Yet with health care, the peril of poor performance is all over the news and the news is quite sobering.
Below are two news stories that colleagues and readers have sent. I think each in its own right, helps frame this issue in “real terms”.
Here is the first regarding the care fall-out associated with the story/saga of HCP and HCR ManorCare. I have written on this subject extensively, with many articles available on this site.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/opioid-overdoses-bedsores-and-broken-bones-what-happened-when-a-private-equity-firm-sought-profits-in-caring-for-societys-most-vulnerable/2018/11/25/09089a4a-ed14-11e8-baac-2a674e91502b_story.html?utm_term=.5eda486f989c
The second story concerns SNF Value-Based Purchasing and how the industry performed in the first phase. Again, I have written articles on VBP which can be found on this site and just conducted a webinar for HCPro on this subject. The article is fascinating in two regards. First, the limited number of facilities/providers that performed above the benchmark – only 27%. Fully 73% of the SNFs performed poor enough in terms of avoidable rehospitalization rates that they are receiving reduced Medicare reimbursement rates as a penalty. For an industry hardly flush with cash, it is incongruous how any organization can perform below standard and take payment cuts. Quality, as I have written and lectured on consistently, rewards and punishes depending on how it is provided (good vs. bad). The article is below.
CMS drops value-based purchasing data, showing 27% of nursing homes got ‘bonus’ pay
I hope readers enjoy both articles as they illustrate far better, the implications of poor quality, than I can via my words.