In this issue:

Patient Insights

• HealthStream is Now a Certified Home Health Care CAHPS Survey Vendor 
• Ask the Experts - HCAHPS and New Discharge Code 
• HCAHPS Essentials 

Improvement Tools

• e-Catalog: 4,000 courses for improving your hospital
• Competency: What is Competency?
• Webinars & Consulting: HealthStream Adds Additional Solutions for the Financial, Operational, and Strategic Challenges Your Hospital Faces
• Webinar: Free Webinar Offered by HFMA on Revenue Cycle Training

HealthStream Is Now a Certified Home Health Care CAHPS Survey Vendor

The Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS®) Home Health Care Survey, hereafter referred to as "Home Health Care CAHPS," (HH-CAHPS) is designed to measure the experiences of people receiving home health care from Medicare-certified home health agencies.  HH-CAHPS will be conducted for home health agencies by approved HH-CAHPS vendors. The national implementation of HH-CAHPS with Medicare-certified home health care agencies will begin in 2009 with agencies that wish to voluntarily participate in the survey. Home health agencies that participate in the national implementation will need to contract with an approved survey vendor to conduct the survey. Approved vendors will then conduct HH-CAHPS on an ongoing basis,  submitting data quarterly. HH-CAHPS results will be publicly reported on Home Health Compare once an agency has four quarters of data.

HealthStream Research participated in the August 17-18, 2009 CMS training for vendors on the new Home Health Care CAHPS Survey. HealthStream Research has completed all requirements to become a certified Home Health vendor. HealthStream Research will begin Home Health data collection in October 2009. CMS is seeking hospitals to participate in modality testing. Please contact HealthStream Research at researchinfo@healthstream.com (or contact your Client Services Manager) if you are interested in participating in the modality testing.

Ask the Experts – HCAHPS and New Discharge Code

“We have heard some rumors about a new discharge code. What is the new code, and what impact will it have on HCAHPS?” 

Click here for the answer

HCAHPS Essentials – October 2009

To access critical HCAHPS news, important updates, and upcoming data submission deadlines, click on the link below.

Click Here for HCAHPS Essentials

Employee Insights

HealthStream Live Webinar:
Measuring for Success: Is Your Employee Survey Enough to Drive Peak Employee Performance?

Presented by:
Randy L. Carden, EdD
Senior Research Consultant, HealthStream Research

Robin Rose, MBA
Senior Vice President, HealthStream Research

Over the past two years, HealthStream Research has introduced a set of new employee surveys and measurement tools that are unique to the healthcare industry.  They are based on research substantiated by experience in other industries and are targeted toward improving the five employee outcomes noted below:

• Satisfied with their work environment
• Intending to stay with the organization
• Acting as goodwill ambassadors for their employer in the community 
• Aligned with the organization's values 
• Inspired to do their best work

The surveys and improvement strategies focus on seven key dimensions of employee experience and engagement that research has shown must be present to achieve high employee performance on all five of these outcomes.  In this webinar, we will discuss these seven dimensions, including two key aspects of employee engagement that are important mediators of employee performance.

Currently, more than 250 healthcare organizations have adopted these tools and are using the HSR model to improve employee performance.  During our session, we will share some of the survey results from these hospitals and show how organizations are using the information to improve employee performance.  

HealthStream Research Brings Deep Insights to Employee Research

The HealthStream Research Employee Insights suite of survey tools allows employees to speak candidly and anonymously to management about their feelings and attitudes through a third party research firm. HealthStream Research provides a multi-dimensional approach to employee measurement. Based on our research, we do not think satisfaction by itself is enough—nor do we support measuring only employee engagement, although other companies have chosen to take this more limited viewpoint. Our research shows there is an important relationship between the two—satisfaction and engagement—that provides hospital administration with the deepest insights into retention and other key bottom line indicators.

Full Article

Improvement Tools

e-Catalog: 4,000 courses for improving your hospital

The HealthStream e-Catalog allows you to browse, search, and preview every single course that HealthStream offers.

Five Key Benefits That Will Make Your Life Easier

1. Find relevant courseware faster through browse and search
2. Have confidence before purchasing by previewing everything
3. Accelerate review and decision-making through “forward to a colleague”
4. Gain insight from the marketplace by reading customer reviews
5. Accelerate securing the necessary pricing information for decision-making
   

Click here to start browsing the HealthStream e-Catalog today!

What is Competency?

Competence is composed of four intertwined components: knowledge, skills, behavior, and judgment. It is the assessment, demonstration, and development of these components that enables organizational excellence by demonstrating a connection between learning, competency, and patient outcomes. An effective competency management solution enables an organization to define the competencies to which they will manage their staff, provide the standardized frameworks and methodology for assessment, and provide outcome measures. We strongly believe, however, a competency management solution must move beyond simple recordkeeping and enable competence to be assessed and demonstrated on the clinical unit through a strong individual, manager, and peer review process.

Full Article

HealthStream Adds Additional Solutions for the Financial, Operational, and Strategic Challenges Your Hospital Faces

HealthStream announces a new partnership with Quorum Health Resources (QHR) that gives customers access to additional solutions for financial, operational, and strategic challenges that face hospitals. QHR is the nation’s largest hospital management company and one of the leading healthcare consulting firms in the United States. Ranked by Modern Healthcare as one of the top 10 healthcare consulting firms in the country, QHR brings an operations perspective to improve all aspects of hospital strategy, finance, and operations performance. In addition, the QHR Learning Institute reaches an annual audience of nearly 8,000 participants for its hospital management programs, which include live and recorded instructor-led online courses; classroom courses; teleconferences; regional and national conferences; and webinars. These new offerings complement HealthStream’s existing learning and research solutions and provide hospitals with an array of robust tools to support clinical, quality, and business initiatives.

If you are interesting in learning more about this range of proven consulting and innovative education and training solutions that can help your hospital achieve operational excellence, please contact your HealthStream account representative.

Free Webinar Offered by HFMA on Revenue Cycle Training

Looking for training for your Revenue Cycle staff? Join us for a free audio webcast on Tuesday, October 20, from 10:00 - 11:00 am CST to learn about HFMA’s education programs for Patient Access, Billing, Compliance, Managing Claims Denials and more. Attendance is granted on a first-come, first-served basis. Register for the free event.

To sign up for the Free Webinar offered by HFMA, Click here

Submit Your Success Story

Has your hospital or healthcare organization done something worth shouting about? Are you ready to share your Success Story with the HealthStream community, with healthcare leaders and professionals just like you? HealthStream is committed to connecting everyone in the HealthStream community to your successes and best practices.

Go to http://www.healthstream.com/mysuccess/ and you’ll find an easy to use form that lets you provide the details of your success. HealthStream will transform your approved submission into a professionally-formatted Success Story document, which you can then use in your own marketing and recruiting efforts.

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