The Link Between Quality & Survey Readiness for Small Rural and CAHs
Webinar

Another distance learning opportunity brought to you by MHA

Series Overview

Part I - Preparing for a Medicare Condition of Participation Survey

Survey readiness is an important piece of life inside a small rural hospital. Poor surveys can result in extra work and inefficient use of use of personnel who already are in short supply. Savvy health care providers are adopting practices that ensure they always are ready for a survey. Having those practices in place enables surveyors to conduct surveys without disrupting operations or unnecessarily impacting resources.

During this session, participants will learn practical approaches directed at continuous survey readiness. The session addresses the importance of building systems to continuously be in control of your environment so survey readiness is a natural by-product of the hospital’s quality efforts. This program will include a written tool that summarizes those important activities that a Critical Access Hospital’s quality program should address in order to be not only survey ready, but also continuously in control of its environment.

Learning Objectives

• Identify key practices critical for continuous readiness for a Medicare Condition of Participation survey;
• Interpret the Medicare survey process; and
• Apply key steps hospital leadership can take for continuous readiness.

Part II - The Essential Building Blocks of a Great Quality Program

The average hospital currently invests 30 to 45 percent of its earned revenues in quality-oriented activities with most of that investment going into activities that don’t truly impact quality improvement.

In this session, we will discuss the essential components of a great quality program which incorporates practical implementation strategies. This session builds on Part I of this series, and introduces an approach that uses “quality calendars” to manage and monitor quality activities in a manner that makes it easy to get it right the first time.

This program shares samples and examples of a quality calendar system currently used by more than 100 small rural hospitals in 10 states. It introduces principles related to the creation of more effective quality programs that reduce waste and increase control over the patient care environment.

Learning Objectives

• Explain three key considerations in effectively managing quality;
• Identify two ways to more effectively manage quality to minimize the risk of error; and
• Evaluate the quality calendar system approach to managing activities.

See brochure (pdf) for specific session details.

Faculty

Darlene D. Bainbridge, RN, CPHQ, CPHRM, D.D., is an experienced health care professional with 27 years dedicated to working with rural and small to mid-sized health care organizations. Her experience includes rural health care delivery, health care administration, network development, risk management and quality improvement, coupled with a clinical background.

For the past eight years, Bainbridge has been involved with the Critical Access Hospital program. Working with this new federal initiative, she served as chief executive officer for a small rural hospital where she and her team restructured the hospital and avoided inevitable closure.

MHA - An Association of Montana Health Care Providers Box 5119 • Helena • MT 59604 — 1720 Ninth Avenue • Helena • MT 59601 Phone: 406-442-1911 / Fax: 406-443-3894 © Copyright 1999 MHA Ventures, Inc.