News: Declines seen for inpatient admissions
CDI Strategies, March 13, 2014
Want to receive articles like this one in your inbox? Subscribe to CDI Strategies!
Since the Institute of Medicine’s November 1999 report “To Err is Human,” a new mantra regarding the structure of healthcare delivery and reimbursement emerged. Today, government reimbursement methods increasingly focus on pay-for-performance, pay-for-quality measures, and strict adherence to rules governing when a patient may be admitted to the hospital for care. Couple these movements with the recent great economic “recession” and the forecast for hospital businesses looks grim, according to recent news reports.
In earnings reports, some of the biggest U.S. hospitals blame weak performance on flagging hospital volumes, according to an article in Modern Healthcare. A report in Healthcare Finance News, states that analysts at both Moody’s Investors Service (in a November 2013 report) and Standard & Poor’s predict a continuing decline in inpatient volumes due at least to some extent to a shift to outpatient care rather than inpatient services.
The theory goes that as inpatient volumes decrease so will hospital revenues. For CDI specialists, this means capturing accurate data for each and every inpatient admission but it may also mean expanding horizons for the future, according to Glenn Krauss, RHIA, CCS, CCS-P, CPUR, FCS, PCS, CCDS, C-CDI, an independent consultant based in Madison, Wisc.
Just as hospitals will need to integrate their businesses to provide care across a continuum, so too will CDI departments need to explore ways to provide value to those various service lines, he says. Outpatient CDI is looking more and more like the wave of the future.
Editor’s Note: Learn more about CDI efforts in the outpatient arena in the following articles:
- “Strive to improve clinical documentation in all settings,” CDI Journal, July 2013.
- “Outpatient CDI efforts offer documentation opportunities,” CDI Journal, January 2012.
- “News: Outpatient CDI efforts on the rise,” CDI Strategies, February 27, 2014.
Want to receive articles like this one in your inbox? Subscribe to CDI Strategies!
Related Products
-
The How-To Manual for Rehab Documentation, Third Edition
Since our last edition, there have been significant changes to the rules and regulations surrounding documentation in...
-
Prevent Denials and Win Appeals:
Hospital case managers and directors of case management will find Prevent Denials and Win Appeals to be a valuable partner...
-
FY2012 IPPS MS-DRG Update: Analyze and Understand the Impact
During the transition to ICD-10, it is critical to keep up with the 2012 MS-DRG reclassifications and MS-DRG changes because...
-
Mastering the Three-Day Payment Window
During this 90 minute audio conference our expert speaker, Kimberly Anderwood Hoy provides a brief history of the rule...
-
Acute and Chronic Renal Failure Coding:
Our experts address new AKIN criteria, acute vs. chronic kidney disease, and other clinical aspects of renal failure and...
Most Popular
- Articles
-
- Don't forget the three checks in medication administration
- Practice the six rights of medication administration
- The consequences of an incomplete medical record
- Nursing responsibilities for managing pain
- Note similarities and differences between HCPCS, CPT® codes
- Q&A: Primary, principal, and secondary diagnoses
- Skills of effective case managers
- Prevent dehydration with nursing interventions
- Implications of CMS Changes to H&P Requirements
- Neurological checks for head injuries
- E-mailed
-
- White Paper: Postacute CDI: An Introduction to Long-Term Acute Care Hospitals
- Use modifiers -59, -91 to "explain" duplicate codes
- Q: Will Medicare cover homecare services to residents of assisted living facilities (ALFs)?
- Know the medical gas cylinder storage requirements
- ICD-10-CM coma, stroke codes require more specific documentation
- Eight tips to improve MRI throughput
- Searched