Quality:
MEDICARE PUSHES PREVENTION OF HOSPITAL READMISSIONS
Published on Tue Mar 24, 2009
14 communities across the nation will aim to reduce rehospitalizations. Individual Quality Improvement Organizations have already been telling the popular pressabout their new Care Transitions projects to prevent unnecessary hospital readmissions, but now the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has made the launch of the program official. CMS has announced 14 communities or areas that will implement the program through QIOs: Providence, R.I.; Upper Capitol Region, N.Y.;Western Pennsylvania; Southwestern New Jersey;Metro Atlanta East, Ga.; Miami; Tuscaloosa, Ala.;Evansville, Ind.; Greater Lansing Area, Mich.;Omaha, Neb.; Baton Rouge, La.; North West Denver, Colo.; Harlingen, Texas; and Whatcom County, Wash. The QIOs for Texas and Louisiana already have started publicizing their campaigns (see Eli's HCW, Vol. XVII, No. 40 and Vol. XVIII, No. 12).IPRO, the QIO for New York, issued a press release about the same time CMS did. Each community will tailor its hospital readmission prevention project to its own specifics,CMS notes [...]