The last two quarters running, Home Health Service of Spearfish and Rapid City each received a five-star quality rating from the U.S. Government’s Medicare Home Health Compare website. The ratings are gathered quarterly and this is the first time both locations have achieved five stars for two consecutive quarters.
“Home Health is skilled services that we provide to patients in the home, who have a skilled need,” says Michelle Sieveke, Director HomeCare/Hospice. “It can be anything from disease process, to therapy to IV infusions. And the goal of Home Health is to keep them out of the hospital and to help a patient get back to their baseline, to their maintenance level. So it’s usually after an exacerbation of a disease or after a procedure or hospitalization.”
The Outcome and Assessment Information Set (OASIS) is data collected by home health organizations so that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) can track patient progression and outcomes. When a patient is admitted, their status is notated using OASIS criteria. For example, are they able to get in and out of the shower? How well do they know their medications?
Likewise, when a patient is discharged, similar data is recorded based on OASIS questions that track progress. Where were they discharged? Do they stay in the community? If the thresholds of an organization don’t improve, it influences the star rating assigned by the CMS score.
We’ve been working on this for years,” says Michelle. “I am very proud of our caregivers and the team’s effort that they have done to achieve this goal. It’s always our goal to improve the combination of great patient care and patient satisfaction.”
The five-star rating not only helps with Monument Health’s patient reputation, it can also improve the bottom line. “Medicare allocates points based on your outcomes, which influences your rating, which informs how much you get paid each year,” Michelle says.
The criteria evolves often, so the changes Home Health may be looking to make in order to maintain their rating can be tricky to achieve. In addition, the ratings are quarterly, so in a way, Michelle and her team are always pivoting and reassessing. “We’re pulling real time data just to see how we’re doing, compared to South Dakota home health agencies, and then also nationally.”
Congratulations to Michelle and the entire Home Health team for providing a caring experience that impacts our communities in such a meaningful way.
Story by: Kory Lanphear