Home Health & Hospice Week

When it comes to developing and endorsing new quality measures for Medicare, there’s a new name to know.

Effective March 27, the National Quality Forum “is no longer the contracted consensus-based entity (CBE) for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS),” NQF says on its website. “Battelle will serve as the CMS CBE for the Measure Applications Partnership,” it says.

“Battelle’s Partnership for Quality Measurement (PQM)™ uses a consensus-based process involving a variety of experts — clinicians, patients, measure experts, and health information technology specialists — to ensure informed and thoughtful endorsement reviews of qualified measures,” the new contractor says on its website.

“Home health and hospice providers interested in quality measure development and evaluation should become acquainted with the new CBE, Battelle,” the National Association for Home Care & Hospice urges. “The PQM will serve the same functions as previously performed by the NQF which includes administering the process for evaluating measures for use in the various CMS quality reporting programs,” NAHC adds.

“Battelle intends for the PQM to be more transparent in this process and includes more stakeholder input. Individuals and organizations can become members of the PQM at no cost,” the trade group says.