OASIS Alert

If your home health agency is one of the many still trying to choose an outcome to focus on during the coming year of the outcome-based quality improvement initiative, this simple chart could make that choice easier.

The beauty of the chart is that it allows agencies to include different sources of information in their decision, and provides an easy way for the agency to put the final decision to a vote, explains Kathy Green, director of education with Tampa, FL-based Provider Solutions, which has provided the tool to Eli. The chart is part of the OBQI Cookbook, which is available for free from Provider Solutions.

First, list up to five outcomes you're considering and note the number of assessments you have for each. Some agencies have purchased quarterly reports from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services that contain benchmarking information for their agencies, Green notes. If you have those reports, use them to help you choose an outcome for OBQI by entering the information from the reports under the "Agency Score" column, she says. If you don't have those reports, just leave the column blank. Then enter the information you gathered from your OBQI report under the "National Score" column.

Similarly, some agencies might have benchmarking information comparing themselves to state scores, or scores from similar agencies. If you have this information, enter it into the "State Score" and "Like Agency" columns.

Once you've filled in the table, simply photocopy it, distribute the page to your employees and have them vote for the outcome(s) they think should be your agency's focus for the coming year. They should use the "Target Outcome" column to mark their choice(s).

This process gets staff members involved in the decision but doesn't bog them down with tons of data to wade through, Green explains. And when staff members are involved in the selection process, they're more likely to buy into your efforts to improve the outcome(s) you choose, Green notes.