New patient survey planned for long-term care to support ratings program, CMS says

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is asking healthcare providers for information to aid in the design of a new survey of patient experience in long-term care hospitals.

The information will be developed into a quality measure for the Long-Term Care Hospital Quality Reporting Program, CMS said in the November 20 request.

Comments are due by January 19, 2016.

The new survey follows the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems survey, a publicly reported survey of patients' perspectives of hospital care. The HCAHPS are used in star ratings that affect payment incentives deemed controversial by some hospitals, due to their base in patient satisfaction rather than clinical care.

[Also: 1-star hospital number falls in latest CMS rankings, 5-stars slide]

CMS has previously implemented Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems patient surveys for inpatient and outpatient settings and for different services such as  Medicare health and drug plans, inpatient hospitals, home health agencies, in-center dialysis facilities, hospices, and Accountable Care Organizations. An aCAHPS survey was recently developed for outpatient and ambulatory surgery centers, and being developed is a new Inpatient Rehabilitation Facility Patient Experience of Care Survey.

The planned long-term care survey consists of patients who have complex and severe conditions and are in need of critical care-related services for an extended period of time, CMS said.

Services provided typically include medical and nursing care, critical care, comprehensive rehabilitation, wound care, respiratory therapy such as ventilator support, head trauma treatment, pain management, case management and social services.

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CMS suggested topic areas include communication with providers, mechanical ventilation, therapy services, wound care, pain management/control or non-pain symptom management, including offering of alternative non-opioid pain management, discussion of safe storage and proper disposal of opioids, screening for overdose risk, and review the history of substance use, rehabilitation services, medical and nursing care, interdisciplinary team goal setting and care planning, family training, and discharge planning. 

Twitter: @SusanJMorse