Medicare Beneficiary Quality Improvement Program (MBQIP)

The federal Office of Rural Health Policy (ORHP) and its partners are charged with increasing current critical access hospitals (CAHs) Hospital Compare participation rates, and CAH dedication to quality improvement initiatives. While participation in the project is voluntary, Medicare Beneficiary Quality Improvement Program (MBQIP) seeks to increase attention on quality health care to all CAH Medicare beneficiaries, both inpatient and outpatient.

Overview

Goal

For 100% (N=1,327) of critical access hospitals (nation-wide) to implement quality improvement initiatives to improve their patient care and operations.

Background

The passage of meaningful use requirements and the Affordable Care Act heightened national attention on quality activities and reporting. In the environment of meaningful use, pay for performance, bundled payments, and accountable care organizations, CAHs may increasingly be compared with their urban counterparts to ensure public confidence in the quality of their health services.

This initiative takes a proactive and visionary approach to ensure CAHs are well-equipped and prepared to meet future quality requirements.

This project emphasizes putting patients first by focusing on improving health care services, processes and administration.

Partner Responsibilities through MBQIP

The North Dakota Flex Program, in partnership with the ND CAH Quality Network and the ND Healthcare Review, Inc. will:

• Support CAHs with technical assistance to improve health care outcomes on Hospital Compare and other national benchmarks
• Assist CAHs in accessing needed technical assistance around data collection and reporting
• Assist CAHs in analyzing their own and comparative data via Hospital Compare
• Work collaboratively with the North Dakota CAH Quality Network, North Dakota Healthcare Review, Inc. and others to assist CAHs with quality improvement

Participating CAHs will:

• Report on a specific set of annual measures and engage in quality improvement projects to benefit patient care
• Collect and submit the measures to Hospital Compare
• Determine appropriate staff to coordinate the project
• Engage in quality improvement trainings
• Implement quality improvement activities

Staff

• Schroeder, Shawnda
• Ward, Jody
• Lockwood, Angela
• Deb Fossum

Funder

• Office of Rural Health Policy, Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services