In his article that advises American Hospital Association member trustees, Rodney Hockman, MD warns that hundreds of hospitals are likely to be penalized by Medicare for patient injuries under the Hospital-Acquired Condition (HAC) Reduction Program starting in October 2014. He points out that each penalized hospital stands to lose nearly $434,000 in Medicare reimbursements on average, with large hospital systems and those with a high volume of Medicare payments potentially facing much greater losses should they provide unsafe care.
Dr. Hochman points to institutions using a bundle of best practices to address this, including 353-bed White Memorial Hospital, part of the Adventist Health System in Los Angeles, to eliminate two of the serious complications used to determine penalties under Medicare’s HAC Reduction Program: pneumothorax and central line-associated bloodstream infections (CLABSIs). Both conditions are now included on AHRQ’s list of patient safety indicators.
