In this issue
Member
spotlight: University of Minnesota Masonic Children’s Hospital reduces harm
This past spring, MHA recognized the University of Minnesota
Masonic Children’s Hospital with the Patient Safety Improvement Award, in the
large hospital category, for its work to reduce harm. The University of
Minnesota Masonic Children's Hospital's instituted a daily safety call that
includes 29 units, including all inpatient units, the emergency department,
lab, pharmacy, ambulatory clinics, patient relations, environmental services
and others. The daily safety call provides a forum to raise quality and patient
safety issues that have occurred over the prior 24 hours or over the weekend to
anticipate potential risks in the next 24 hours. The daily safety call
increases situational awareness for leaders throughout the hospital and helps
to identify and resolve issues much more efficiently. It has also increased
engagement of front line staff for incident reporting and increased the
hospital's rate of good catches. Since initiating the daily safety call in May
2013, the hospital has experienced increased incident reporting, a 24 percent
reduction in preventable harm and a reduced severity of harm. The call has been
so successful, it has been spread to adult medical center and is having an
impact there as well. Learn more about the 2015 MHA award recipients here. return to top
Governor
Dayton signs HHS Omnibus bill
Governor Dayton signed the Health and Human Services Omnibus
Finance Bill Chapter 71 into law last week. The legislation contains many
provisions of interest to the hospital and health care community:
- The MinnesotaCare program was
preserved with some additional cost sharing for enrollees.
- Critical Access Hospitals
received additional funding.
- Hospital inpatient mental
health services received additional funding.
- A new distribution formula for
Disproportionate Share Hospital (DSH) payments was included in the
legislation.
- The new formula targets funding for children’s
hospitals, psychiatric inpatient services, transplants and high volume
Medical Assistance providers.
- Significant new investments in
mental health services.
- The Medical Education and
Research Cost (MERC) program, residency programs and other workforce
investments including additional funding for loan forgiveness.
- The MN Telemedicine Act will
require health plans to pay for services on the same basis and at the same
rate regardless of whether they are delivered via telemedicine or on an
in-person basis. The Medical Assistance program will also be required to
cover an expanded list of providers who are now allowed to bill for
services provided via telemedicine. The provision requiring an
originating site fee for health care providers was deleted from the bill.
- The legislation requires
hospitals have violence prevention plans and provide staff training.
- The legislation contained
additional funding for nursing home reform and payment increases.
For information about the Health and Human Services Omnibus
Finance bill, contact Mary Krinkie, MHA vice president of government
relations, 651-6519-1465 or Kristin Loncorich, MHA director of government
relations, 651-603-3526. A complete analysis of the 2015 legislative session
will be in our annual legislative report provided to members in a few
weeks. return to top
MNCM
announces Health Care Innovation Awards
In celebration of its 10th anniversary, MN Community
Measurement is recognizing organizations in the community that have helped
achieve its mission of improving health and health care in Minnesota. To that
end, MNCM will be awarding Leadership in Health Care Innovation Awards to
organizations that have implemented programs that improve health or health care
by utilizing information collected or measures developed by MNCM. Any type of
organization is eligible to enter.
Your organization’s innovation must have:
- Utilized data collected and
provided by MNCM and/or a MNCM‐developed measure;
- Been implemented between
6/1/2005 and 6/1/2015; and,
- Resulted in demonstrable
positive impacts on health and/or health care.
Nominations are due by July 15, 2015 and winners
will be announced at the MNCM 10th anniversary dinner on Sept. 24,
2015. For additional details and the submission form, go to: http://mncm.org/mncm-leadership-in-health-care-innovation-awards/. return to top