HCAHPS Survey Analysis

The Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers (HCAHPS) began in 2006 with a 27 question survey that is distributed to discharged patients. This survey process was originally designed to help patients compare hospitals in their area to be able to make an informed choice for their healthcare needs. In January 2013, five additional questions were added to the survey. Beginning this year, Medicare reimbursement rates to a hospital are tied to the hospital’s patient satisfaction scores. Therefore, hospitals are continually looking for ways to improve

In this article, Working Together to improve the Patient Experience, author Richard Billingsley(2014) explains how working together amongst providers, the patients, and the patient's family improves the patient experience, thus markedly heightening the quality of care. In this article, he also shares how other organizations have successfully adopted a model to facilitate cultural change within their facilities. This cultural model is referred to as patient family centered care (PFCC), and while it is not a new concept, it's emphasis has gained popularity as insurance companies adjust the criteria that encompasses what constitutes as high quality care.

Healthcare is in a constant state of change with movements that impact rates, access and quality of care. Hospitals have become more competitive due to the rising cost of care delivery and the reduction in reimbursement from payers. This causes difficulty in delivering quality care to all patients, which is being measured by mandated patient perception surveys, Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS). HCAHPS scores are part of value

Satisfaction scores are based on the percentage of participants scoring a question given with the highest possible response such as “definitely yes or always”. These scores are then used to make improvements to the services that the hospital provides. The marks are compared to other hospitals in the area with the same specialty service during the period of July 2016 until December of 2015. The Sterling Heights Medical Center location scored above average in the following areas: Overall satisfaction with the physician 88.2 % with the other Michigan hospitals scoring 87.0%. How well the patient’s pain was controlled was 84.7% with other local hospitals scoring 80.9%, and the nursing care satisfaction was 89.5% with other local hospitals scoring 88.2%. Henry Ford Hospital is located on W. Grand Blvd in downtown Detroit was one of the HFHS locations that scored below average as compared to other Southeast Michigan Hospitals. The results are as follows: Overall satisfaction with physician was 84.9% with local hospitals scoring 87.0%. How well the patient’s pain was controlled scored 75.5% as compared to 80.9%, and nursing care came in at 83.3% with the local average being 88.2% (Patient Satisfaction Survey,

For the last five weeks research has been done on Kaiser Permanente, an organization that contains Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Kaiser Foundation Hospitals and Permanente Medical Groups in eight regions. Since its inception in 1945, Kaiser Permanente has become the largest not-for-profit, integrated health care delivery system in the United States, serving 8.6 million members in eight regions: Northern and Southern California, Colorado, Georgia, Hawaii, the Mid-Atlantic States, Ohio, and the Northwest. About three quarters of the members are in California, the organization’s birthplace. It is the largest nonprofit integrated health care delivery system in the United States. Its mission is to provide affordable, high-quality health care services to improve the health of their members and the communities they serve. For the purpose of this research, focus will be on Northern California in a randomly selected hospital.

With patients today using the threat of reporting low satisfaction rates in the hopes of receiving faster or higher quality care, they seem to have taken the upper hand in some of the decision making of what will take place in the healthcare world (Sullivan). But is it really the survey results that will make the drastic changes that are needed?

Hospitals in the United States offer top quality care to its citizens but regrettably not everyone receives equal access to this care. There is an alarming difference between qualities of care received by some population groups relative to other population groups.

Many entities outside of nursing are making initiatives to measure the quality and safety of the patient experience such as the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) and Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). The CMS Partnership for Patients Program (PPP) is a group of over 8000 hospitals, representative of health care organizations, state governments, employers, and unions. Partnership for patients is focused on providing safer, more reliable and less costly hospital care. Other organizations such as not- for-profit groups focus on improving relationship between patients, families and health care professionals. The goal of enhancing this relationship is to ensure the provision of high quality care, delivery of safe care, reduction of the cost of care, and enhancement in the transition of care from provider to the next level of care. Even though nurses strive to provide safe and high quality care, they often lost their hope in patient satisfaction scores, performance improvement and quality measurement. Nurse are willing to provide the best care to their patients and committed to the process of improvement, if their efforts are resulted in better patient outcomes. According to the 2014, issue of the New England journal of medicine, a CMS report of 2013 confirmed that the partnership for patients at an estimated cost of $1 billion, showed early elective deliveries in the CMS hospital engagement networks were down by 48% and nationally, readmissions were

Heritage Valley Medical Center has been known for it’s stellar reputation of providing excellent care to residents of the surrounding community. In recent years, it has had a changing demographic, and occupancy rates have decreased to 40%. This is due to the relocation of more affluent private-pay patients from the city to the suburbs. The center has developed alliances to increase Medicare referrals and indigent patients, with the hope of increasing additional Medicaid revenue. Although the minority population has increased from 10% to 40%, the staff demographics did not change. There is still a disproportionately low number of minorities employed by the facility, and an even lower number of minorities in management

Survey of patient’s experiences is important source of information of the quality of health care provided by the particular hospital, which allows patients to compare the hospitals in the area. The HCAHPS star rating of Gulf Coast Hospital and Bay Medical Center is two stars, while Sacred Heart Hospital is rated with four stars on the excellence of care. The outliner indicators for Gulf Coast Medical Center in the survey of patients’ experiences on the question: “How often did patients receive help quickly from the hospital staff?” shows that 74% patients pick the answer “always communicated well”, that is slightly lower than national average with 79%. The survey question “How often were the patients’ rooms and bathrooms kept clean” only 61% of the patients pick that their bathroom and room were “always clean” that is much lower than the national average 74% and only 47% of the patients understood the care that was provided when they were

A realization has occurred among stakeholders that the health care system is in need of change. In a poll conducted by the Kaiser Family

Due to the changing demographics of our society, hospitals and health systems need to be more diverse. Employees need to be hired that match the ethnic make-up of those they serve. Training for employees to be able understand others beliefs and values will support the patient-provider relationship. Finally, by promoting diversity within the health system, potential patients will be drawn into the system for care when historically they shied away from major institutions. By making culturally proficient care and treatment a priority, healthcare organizations will decrease “the gap in health status between minorities and other majority groups, patient-provider communication barriers, poor health outcomes for minorities and the presence of biases and prejudices among some health professionals” (Hart & Mareno 2013, p. 2223). This paper, will examine Hospital Corporation of America’s (HCA) website diversity.

Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems is a series of patient surveys required by The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) for all hospitals rating health care experiences in the United States. “The intent of the HCAHPS is to provide a standardized 32-item survey instrument and data collection methodology for measuring patients perspectives on hospital care.” (HCAHPS Hospital Survey) Until the HCAHPS, there were no common metrics and no national standards for collecting and reporting information about patient experience of care. Since 2008, HCAHPS has allowed valid comparisons made across hospitals locally, regionally and nationally.

Press Ganey’s Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) is an important survey used by my organization to change practices to deliver care that is focused on increasing patient satisfaction scores. HCAHPS is an important

Patient satisfaction plays an important role in the facility’s score in HCAHPS survey. In order to improve in the area Your Care from Nurses, we as nurses have to ensure to provide patient care in a caring way, after all we are in the caring profession. Keeley, Wolf, Regul, and Jadwin (2015) stated that “nurse caring is valued by nursing staff as essential to clinical practice” (p. 354). The authors aimed to show that patient satisfaction is greatly improved when the facility adopts a caring protocol. This caring protocol is the application of the nursing staff of caring behaviors, activities, and treating patient as individuals. Patients’ perception of their care is what is measured with HCAHPS and the American Sentinel University (2012) stated