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From the CRC Blog: Is the NPDB’s Proactive Disclosure Service for you?

Credentialing & Verification Update, December 23, 2008

I’ve been considering signing up for the Proactive Disclosure Service (PDS) but thought it was too expensive. So I did a little homework and here’s what I discovered: The PDS meets the mandatory hospital query requirements of the Health Care Quality Improvement Action of 1986. It is acceptable to The Joint Commission, Healthcare Facilities Accreditation Program, National Committee for Quality Assurance, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, and Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities as an alternative to direct querying the National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB).

Several hospitals that I contacted that are using PDS are very pleased with the streamlined and efficient process. Those that are not using PDS indicate that they consider the service too expensive.

I created a scenario to look at actual costs. The number of practitioners at my make-believe hospital is 1,200. I process 150 applications each year. My average reappointment number is 600. Approximately 70 practitioners add new privileges each year. Based on the current PDS enrollment rate of $3.25 per practitioner, I calculated the following:

One of the benefits of PDS is the notification you receive when a report is filed on one of your enrolled practitioners. You get notified immediately and do not have to wait for reappointment to learn about new actions.

What is not included in the calculation is staff time. How much staff time does it take to query and retrieve reports? Would staff time cost be less than $492.50/year?

Carole La Pine, MSA, CPMSM, CPCS is the Manager for Physician Services at Trinity Health in Novi, MI. Carole has more than 30 years of experience in the medical staff services profession and is a past president of National Association Medical Staff Services (NAMSS). Read more from Carol at the Credentialing Resource Center Blog.

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