Home Health Quality ImprovementNational Campaign e-Bulletin
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June 2007 e-Bulletin

Participating Home Health Agencies

As of May 25, 2007, a total of 5,126 home health agencies have signed up for the HHQI National Campaign. This represents 60 percent of Medicare-certified agencies nationwide (as of the 3/29/07 Home Health Compare update).

HHQI National Campaign Teleconference
For all participating home health agencies and LANEs
June 20, 2007 at 3 p.m. EDT

  • Free one-hour teleconference for participating HHAs and LANEs
  • Important information about the HHQI National Campaign
  • Highlights from agency leaders.

Home health agencies and LANEs, don’t miss this important teleconference! It will be recorded, and the recording will be available on www.homehealthquality.org.

Open registration is between June 1 and June 15. Be sure to register at the HHQI Web site. One line per agency please.

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Best Practice Intervention Package
   

Best Practice Intervention Package: Phone Monitoring and Frontloading Visits

This package is the first in the Simply Summer Series, which are similar and focus on the telehealth topic. The schedule for the Simply Summer Series is:

  • June - Phone Monitoring and Frontloading Visits
  • July - Teletriage
  • August - Telemonitoring

The Phone Monitoring and Frontloading Visits package offers leadership education on telehealth, as well as benefits and considerations for phone monitoring and frontloading visits.

Two leadership tracks are offered: the Leadership Path for those that are not using the interventions and the Leadership Highway for those agencies that need to optimize telehealth interventions.

Some of the tools and resources included are a Checklist for Clinicians, Phone Monitoring Assessment Guides, and documentation templates. Additionally, the Connection pages provide suggestions for agencies to improve relationships and communications with other providers.

The Care Provider Track includes a variety of activities for education. The Nurse Track offers 1.5 free CNEs. The Therapy Track will now offer a certificate of participation for completing the track.

Reminder: Just pick and choose the pieces of the package your agency can utilize.

Fast Track

A Fast Track is also offered for those agencies that have limited time or resources to implement the Best Practice Intervention Package – Phone Monitoring and Frontloading Visits.

CNEs

Registered Nurses: Free Continuing Nurses Education (CNEs) contact hours are available for the following packages:

Registered nurses can complete the Nursing Tracks in any of these packages (and future packages) and complete an online evaluation and post-test. The certificate will be sent electronically within 30 days, or a letter will be sent explaining how to re-apply if candidates were unsuccessful.

The Best Practice Intervention Packages with CNEs will be available through February 29, 2008.

Therapy Certificate of Participation - NEW!
Beginning with the Phone Monitoring and Frontloading Visits Package, therapists (PT, OT, & ST) may apply for a certificate of participation that they may use toward their required contact hours. The therapist completes the required activities in the Therapy Track and completes an online evaluation and post-test. The certificate will be sent electronically within 30 days, or a letter will be sent explaining how to re-apply if candidates were unsuccessful.

Each discipline’s national and/or state requirements are different. See the Continuing Education FAQ document for more information related to disciplines.

In addition to the certificate, a PDF file is available on the HHQI Web site with credentials and outlines of the educational activity if a therapist needs to submit that information for his or her contact hours.

Continuing Education FAQs
An FAQ sheet is available to assist with some of your questions related to the continuing education opportunities with the HHQI Campaign.

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Additional Resources
   
Previous Best Practice Intervention Packages

The May Best Practice Intervention Package (BPIP) focused on medication management.

April's BPIP focused on emergency care planning.

The BPIP for March focused on hospitalization risk assessment.

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The HHQI Web site is updated weekly with additional information, tools and resources. Bookmark the Web site and visit it weekly. The Quick Links on the home page facilitates easy travel to important sites.

What's New?

Podcast: Reducing Avoidable Hospitalizations: Home Health and Disease Management
Take five minutes and listen to the audio recording of Dr. David Nash to hear the physician perspective on the role of home health in disease management and reducing avoidable hospitalizations. Dr. Nash is internationally recognized for his work in outcomes management, medical staff development, and quality-of-care improvement and his publications have appeared in more than 100 articles in major journals.

Medication Management BPIP Survey

Summary of Results
The survey results from the Medication Management BPIP are now available on the HHQI Web site.

The Best Practice Intervention Package Survey helps the HHQI team:

  • improve the packages
  • understand barriers to accessing the packages, etc.
  • know whether we are on target with the materials
  • recognize when there is a need modify the materials.

Thanks to everyone who completed the survey. The next survey will be available June 7 – June 14 and will focus on the Phone Monitoring and Frontloading Visits BPIP.

Home Health Agency of the Month

Florida Hospital Home Care Services
Orlando, FL

“Florida Hospital Home Care Services is very excited to be part of the home health quality initiative campaign. Our goal is to change the culture of learning for our clinicians. With the help of your campaign, we are positive that we will attain our goals and improve patient outcomes.”
– Debra Alstott, Performance Improvement Analyst

For Hospitals

The For Hospitals page on www.homehealthquality.org is designed to keep hospitals informed of the HHQI National Campaign.

To better understand how all providers can work to deliver the right care at the right time, every time read the Seven Key Points For Improving Patient Care Coordination Between Health Care Providers.

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The American College of Physicians’ publication, ACP Observer, featured the article “Home Health Link Helps Avoid Costly Hospitalizations” in its May 2007 issue. This article discussed the work of the HHQI National Campaign and the need for physicians and home care staff to collaborate to avoid unnecessary hospitalizations. This article can be accessed on ACP's Web site.

Cross-Setting Connection

Do Managed Care Organizations understand the value of the HHQI Campaign? Here is an example of a monthly update that was forwarded to managed care contacts locally:

Please forward to those within your organization that work with home health:
Participation in the Home Health Quality Improvement National Campaign has topped 5,000 Medicare-certified home health agencies!

Campaign Goal - Patients receiving home health care will remain in their home setting and will require fewer avoidable hospitalizations.

What Managed Care Can Do:

  • Facilitate or advocate for home health clinical interventions that will promote cost-effective quality outcomes by supporting HHQI Best Practices.
  • Know which home health agencies are participating in the HHQI Campaign.
  • Open communication with your contracted home health agencies about participation in the campaign and implementation of best practices. Use the HHQI Talking Points for Managed Care. (available on the For Managed Care page of HHQI Web site)
  • Share "Success Stories” of how managed care and home health agencies can collaborate to reduce avoidable hospitalizations.
  • Stay informed - register as a Campaign Supporter to receive the monthly information e-Bulletin.
  • For more information go to www.homehealthquality.org.

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Tips of the Week
   

View the May 2007 Tips of the Week.

View the April 2007 Tips of the Week.

View the March 2007 Tips of the Week.

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e-Bulletin Archive
   

View the May 2007 e-Bulletin.

View the April 2007 e-Bulletin.

View the March 2007 e-Bulletin.

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 If you have technical problems with the e-Bulletin, please e-mail Russell Hartman.

  
 
This material was prepared by Quality Insights of Pennsylvania, the Medicare Quality Improvement Organization Support Center for Home Health, under contract with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The contents presented do not necessarily reflect CMS policy. Publication number 8SOW-PA-HHQ07.507. App. 5/30/07.