Study: Safety Net ERs not at Disadvantage on Meeting Proposed Length-of-Stay Measures

The authors wrote that there is a concern that performance measures for EDs approved in 2008 by the National Quality Forum could result in safety-net hospitals being harmed if the measures are used in pay-for-performance programs. The fear is that safety net providers—which care for a disproportionate amount of Medicaid and uninsured patients—might be harmed by the 2 new measures, which look at time to discharge, transfer or held for observation and at time to inpatient admission.

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Source: Modern Healthcare

The study compared performance against criteria not in the NQF measures but ones used by other groups: 4 hours for time-to-discharge, transfer or observation, and 8 hours for time-to-admission.

Safety net hospital emergency departments are not at a disadvantage in terms of meeting the terms of proposed length-of-stay measures for patients both admitted and discharged, according to a new study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association.