Hospital-Acquired Condition Reduction Program is not associated with additional patient safety improvement

Sheetz KH, Dimick JB, Englesbe MJ, Ryan AM. Hospital-Acquired Condition Reduction Program Is Not Associated With Additional Patient Safety Improvement. Health Aff. Nov, 2019;38(11):1858-1865.

Since 2013, Medicare’s Hospital-Acquired Condition Reduction Program (HACRP) has reduced payments to hospitals with elevated rates of specific outcomes deemed to be preventable sources of harm. To better understand the impact of the HACRP in Michigan, this study used a surgical registry to compare trends in rates of outcomes targeted by the program to concurrent trends for other hospital-acquired conditions, such as postoperative cardiac arrest and postoperative pneumonia. The authors saw an overall decrease in all hospital-acquired conditions over the eight-year study period but did not identify a statistically significant change in the rate of HACRP-targeted versus non-targeted conditions. The authors acknowledge that these findings may not be generalizable nationally because of robust quality improvement efforts already in place in Michigan, such as existence of other quality improvement efforts, such as the AHRQ-recognized Michigan Surgical Quality Collaborative and the Hospital Engagement Network

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