KHA is excited to bring two new tracks to this year's Convention, May 10-11 in Lexington. In addition to the Nurse Leaders, Health Care Attorneys and Physician Tracks, this year's event will feature Tracks for Hospital Trustees and Foundation Directors.

Trustees can participate in a two-part session on Governing in Today's Health Care World.

Foundation Directors will learn Lessons for Charities from the 2017 Tax Reform, explore how to Create, Enhance and Elevate a Culture of Philanthropy in Health Care.

KHA's Convention registration is available on KHA's brand new website, www.kyha.com. If you have not visited and set up your account, now is the perfect opportunity to do so. If you've registered on the old site in the past, you should already have an account in the new system. Your user name will be your email address, and you just need to reset...

While hospitals prefer to avoid temporary staffing, the use of travelers remains a viable solution when more traditional approaches are not successful.

Qualivis is a national provider of health care workforce solutions, specializing in supplemental staffing, but able to fill a broad spectrum of clinical and non-clinical positions through its nationwide network of more than 100 staffing agencies.

Qualivis simplifies the staffing process by offering one contract and one point of contact at no cost to the health care employer.

Qualivis is a Managed Service Provider (MSP), wholly owned by the South Carolina Hospital Association (SCHA). For 15 years, they have been helping state hospital associations provide supplemental staffing for every clinical and non-clinical department.

Benefits include:...

The room block for KHA's 89th Annual Convention, May 10-11 in Lexington is only available until April 18. Please make your reservations by April 18 to assure that you will receive the convention rate ($159/night). Reservations requests after the cutoff date will be confirmed on an availability basis.

Hyatt Regency Lexington Reservations: (800) 233-1234 Online Reservations: https://book.passkey.com/event/49432265/owner/8515/home

KHA's Convention registration is available on KHA's brand new website, www.kyha.com. If you have not visited and set up your account, now is the perfect opportunity to do so. If you've registered on the old site in the past, you should already have an account in the new system. Your user name will be your email address,...

Safety Net Hospitals struggle to stretch scarce resources to provide crucial services to their patients while meeting their bottom line. It doesn’t have to be this way. When managed compliantly, the 340B program does what it was intended to do: secure the financial future of safety net organizations who serve the nation’s vulnerable population. The 340B program can have a significantly positive impact for hospitals, their patients, and their communities if hospitals know how to administer and manage the program effectively.

By utilizing KHA Solution Group's Affinity Partner SUNRx as their 340B Administrator, safety net hospitals have the ability to tap into the benefits the 340B program can provide:

Increasing financial support that enables hospitals to provide better care

Improving patient outcomes

Helping the indigent/uninsured gain access to the discounted medications they need.

SUNRx’s uninsured discount prescription card program provides a conduit for safety...

Registration is now open for KHA's 89th Annual Convention, May 10-11 in Lexington. Join your colleagues from across the state for two days of engaging presentations, continuing education credits, ACHE face-to-face credits and excellent opportunities for networking.

Online registration is available on KHA's brand new website, www.kyha.com. If you have not visited and set up your account, now is the perfect opportunity to do so. If you've registered on the old site in the past, you should already have an account in the new system. Your user name will be your email address, and you just need to reset your account with a new password.

View the Convention program for agenda and location details.

If you have any questions,...

The American Hospital Association (AHA) will hold its annual meeting in Washington D.C., May 6-9. The AHA Luncheon starts on Sunday, May 6 at noon.

KHA has booked a block of rooms at Kimpton Hotel Palomar for KHA members planning to attend. If you wish to stay at the KHA host hotel, at your expense, please complete the AHA Hotel Reservation Form and return to Claire Arant at KHA (carant@kyha.com) by Friday, March 30. The reservations will be submitted to the hotel by KHA.

The KHA Legislative Committee will meet on Tuesday, May 7, and participants will meet with their U.S. legislators during Capitol Hill appointments on Tuesday and Wednesday, May 7 and 8.

Please, register online at www.aha.org to attend the conference.

If...

KHA is pleased to announce the 3rd Quarter 2017 Hospital CEO Dashboard Report. KHA has sent the reports via email to all hospital CEOs. The CEO Dashboard contains: 



Hospital Utilization Data  Hospital Physician Data (Attending and Surgical)  Hospital Product Line Distribution  Financial Data (Payer Information)  Quality Data  Workforce Data **KHA will collect Referring Physician data as of October 1, 2017, and future reports will contain Referring and Surgical Physician data.

The data sources for this report includes KHA InfoSuite, Kentucky Quality Counts (K-HIIN) data, Hospital Compare and KHA Annual Workforce Survey data.

If you have any questions or concerns regarding the data, please contact Chuck Warnick (cwarnick@kyha.com) or Melanie Moch (mmoch@kyha.com).

...

The AHA Annual Survey for fiscal year 2017 is now open. KHA will again provide front-line support for Kentucky hospitals. KHA's goal is to reach 80% participation by the state's hospitals. Please, complete the survey by May 18, 2018.

It is vitally important to collect accurate and updated information about all institutions each year. Health care leaders, policy makers and researchers use the AHA Annual Survey to better describe and understand the operations of U.S. hospitals.

The 2017 survey is being offered ONLINE at www.ahasurvey.org. If you have not done so before, you are encouraged to take advantage of the online data collection. More than 4,000 of your colleagues completed their survey electronically last year. The web-based collection tool is easy, efficient and secure. Entering the data online allows you to:

Receive real-time reports, enabling you to confirm the accuracy of your entry before submission and provide...

KHA held its first of  four spring district meetings today. Please, register now for the 3 remaining districts. This is a great opportunity to be involved with the Association and network with your peers.

TODAY  Cumberland District Saint Joseph London        March 16  Blue Grass District  Gateway Rehabilitation Hospital Florence     March 22  Twin Lakes District Baptist Health Madisonville     March 23  Ohio Valley District  KHA Headquarters Louisville See the brochure for more details on the agenda and registration. If you have any questions, please contact Pam...

The long-awaited revised home health conditions of participation were effective January 13. The importance of knowing the content and expectations for accreditation surveys is imperative whether your agency has deemed status through an accreditation organization or a survey by your state agency. On March 1, KHA will host a 90-minute webinar to provide a review of key aspects of the final version of the interpretive guidelines for the home health conditions of participation (HH CoP), the first changes in HH COP since 1996.

View the brochure for agenda details. Online registration is open for you convenience.

If you have any questions, please contact Sharon Perkins at...

On March 6, KHA will host a webinar s devoted to reviewing the current status of Recovery Audit Contractor (RAC) activities along with due consideration to the new contracts, scope of works, and various RAC approved issues.

Included in this program will be recent events surrounding the RACs and the backlog of appeals at the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) and Medicare Appeals Council (MAC) level. OMHA has proposed several different ways to address their enormous backlog of appeals including statistical extrapolation, settlement conferences, and administrative agreements. One of the main issues is that of medical necessity for inpatient admissions. The inpatient issues have sparked the development of the ‘Over 2-Midnights’ rule. CMS has also proposed changes to the appeals process in order to expedite the resolution of the backlog of appeals. The expansion of the RACs to the Medicare Advantage Programs is still in the works with the Risk Adjustment Data Validation (RADV) with a concentration on both comprehensive...

The Medicare EHR Incentive Program attestation deadline for eligible hospitals and CAHs has been changed from Wednesday, February 28, 2018, to Friday, March 16, 2018, at 11:59 p.m. (PT). Similarly, the attestation deadline for the Hospital IQR Program electronic clinical quality measure (eCQM) data submission for the Calendar Year (CY) 2017 reporting period has been changed from Wednesday, February 28, 2018, to Friday, March 16, 2018, at 11:59 p.m. (PT).

CMS states that some hospitals and their health information technology (IT) vendors need additional time to submit their eCQM data and attest for Medicare EHR Incentive Program requirements.

The deadline is fast approaching for providers to submit data for the 2017 Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) performance period to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Eligible clinicians must submit before March 31 to avoid the negative payment adjustment for each claim beginning January 1, 2019.

You are strongly encouraged to submit your data prior to the deadline to avoid a 4% decrease in Medicare reimbursement in 2019. 

MIPS Test Data Submission is easy, free and you have access to free assistance from the atom Alliance Quality Improvement Organization (QIO) and Qsource.

To determine if you are required to participate in the MIPS, use the MIPS Eligibility Tool at https://qpp.cms.gov/participation-lookup and enter your NPI. 

View the Clinician Advisory...

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ (CMS) Annual Call for Measures for Eligible Hospitals and Critical Access Hospitals participating in the Medicare Electronic Health Record (EHR) Incentive Program is now open. Submit a measure proposal ...

On January 25, KHA Solutions Group Affinity Partner Healthcare Staffing Services (HSS) officially changed its name and brand to Qualivis.

Qualivis is a national provider of health care workforce solutions, specializing in supplemental staffing and committed to quality, service and leadership in transforming the workplace culture to improve patient care.

The name “Qualivis” is a combination of three words that capture who they are, what they do and why they do it.

Quality – Their core mission is to provide outstanding health care team members to improve the patient experience and outcome, exemplify best practices in all facets of business operations and strive for excellence and continuous improvement in all that they do. Life – They provide solutions to give your team members more work-life balance and greater job satisfaction to improve retention and productivity. Qualivis provides flexible, supplemental staffing who...

Registration is now open for the Annual KHA Quality Conference, March 14-16 in Louisville.

Hospitals, physicians and other health providers are experiencing the need to improve the services and skills they previously offered to meet the growing needs of tomorrow’s communities. This is a time when all of health care needs to crowd together to seek innovations and maximize the quality service provided to patients at all levels of care. 

At the core of every functional and efficient team is a stable leader who operates with integrity and determination. Keynote speakers Pat Day, Joe Pusateri and Christian Lillis have demonstrated this through the impressive achievements acquired over the course of their careers. The Kentucky Hospital Association’s Annual Quality Conference will begin with an afternoon on Leadership, followed by a day dedicated to Falls and Infections, and...

The Cabinet for Health and Family Services (CHFS) is sponsoring and funding two free training sessions on the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) Treatment of Opioid Use Disorder (OUD) Course. The course is designed to help practitioners who work with opioid use disorder patients to obtain a waiver to prescribe buprenorphine in office-based treatment of OUDs. 

The first training will be on February 24 in Lexington, and the second training will be on March 10 in Hazard. Visit the corresponding links for session details and registration information. 

This one-day program will provide valuable information for those individuals who are responsible for creating the best possible Environment of Care and Life Safety programs and must understand the Joint Commission survey methodology and recent changes to the standards. Attendees will be able to implement a practical, continuously compliant program for health care facilities to achieve maximum performance while effectively preparing for unscheduled Joint Commission and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) surveys. Participants will also receive specific guidance in how to understand and interpret the most serious deficiencies that are common in surveys. Sufficient time will also be provided for questions and discussion.

The event will be held February 27 at the Hilton Garden Inn Northeast in Louisville.

View the brochure...

To ensure the safety of the Association's staff,  KHA Headquarters will be closed on Friday, January 12 due to the threat of inclement weather.

Staff will monitor their email and voice mails and get back with any requests as soon as possible.

The office is scheduled to re-open on Monday for regular business hours.

KHA and the K-HIIN group recently recognized David Nicholson, staff educator at The Ridge Behavioral Health System as the latest Patient Safety Hero Awardee. Nicholson was nominated by Kellie Holland, associate administrator at The Ridge, for being instrumental in creating a culture of safety for both patients and staff.

Nicholson is committed to reducing incidents of seclusion, restraint, patient aggression with injury and patient aggression without injury. To achieve these objectives, he focuses on non-physical forms of de-escalation in a crisis and helps staff prioritize when to use physical interventions. 

Nicholson volunteered for training to be an instructor for both Handle With Care (HWC) and Verbal De-escalation. Within two weeks of becoming...

Stay one step ahead by registering for a free, one-hour webinar to educate hospitals on how the recent Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) payment policy changes (finalized November 1, 2017) impact hospital 340B Pharmacy Programs.

The American Hospital Association’s Aimee Kuhlman and Molly Collins will speak for 10-15 minutes on what the AHA is doing to represent hospitals’ 340B interests at the federal level. The rest of the webinar will be on the impact of the CMS changes in 340B Pharmacy and the actions a hospital can take.

Brought to you by the Kentucky Hospital Association in conjunction with SunRx, a compliance-focused 340B Drug Discount Program Administrator



Title: Trends and Drivers in 340B

Who should attend: Directors of Pharmacy, Pharmacy managers, CFOs or others responsible for profit/loss of hospital 340B programs

Registration: https://sunrx.webex.com/sunrx/onstage/g.php?MTID=e897bea4765d949bcd93825c0c1a2bd87

...

Please register today for the KHA Hospital Day at the Legislature on February 22 at 8:00 a.m. (ET). The event begins with breakfast at the Frankfort Country Club. Adam Meier, deputy chief of staff for the Governor’s Office, will discuss the implementation of the 1115 Medicaid Waiver; Senator Ralph Alvarado, MD and Representative Addia Wuchner will discuss key health legislation before the General Assembly; and Brandon Smith, executive director of Kentucky’s Cabinet for Health and Family Services (CHFS), will discuss the Cabinet’s priorities. Members will go to the Capitol at 10:15 a.m. to meet with their legislators. Attendees are asked to make appointments accordingly.

All Senate and House members are invited to a luncheon with KHA members from 12:00 to 1:45 p.m. in Room 125 of the Capitol Annex. Please extend a personal invitation to your legislators to attend the luncheon. RSVP with Claire Arant at KHA (carant@kyha.com) no later than Friday,...

Make, manage and automate your hospital’s payments, from invoice capture and workflow approval to payment optimization, with CommerceVantage ® – a comprehensive suite of AP solutions.

Powered by Commerce Bank, a national leader in payments and revenue cycle management, CommerceVantage® combines the latest in accounts payable technology to create process efficiencies and revenue share opportunities with secure payment programs.

Eliminate paper invoices Enhance process efficiencies Gain real-time visibility into your payment process Earn monthly revenue share For more information, visit Commerce Bank’s CommerceVantage website or contact Pam Kirchem at KHA Solutions Group (pkirchem@kyha.com or 502-426-6220).

...

The KHA office will close Monday, December 25, and Tuesday, December 26. There will be no KHA Health e-News during the week of Christmas.

The office will close again on Monday, January 1.

Have a wonderful holiday and a Happy New Year!

Register now for the first Kentucky Chapter ACHE program of 2018. A panel of your peers will speak to the importance of medical staff relations. The program will be held on February 22 from 2:00 to 3:30 p.m. (ET) — the afternoon of the Kentucky Hospital Day at the Legislature (separate registration).

View the brochure for agenda and registration details.

If you have any questions, please contact Pam Kirchem at KHA (pkirchem@kyha.com).

Republic Bank’s Assistant Vice President and Treasury Management Officer, Alisha Deatrick presented KHA President Michael T. Rust with a sponsorship check to the Kentucky Hospital Research & Education Foundation. Republic Bank’s Platinum sponsorship is affirmation that the organization values a strong alliance with health care leaders in the commonwealth.

Headquartered in Louisville, Republic Bank has over 45 banking centers across five states and $5 billion in assets. KHA thanks Republic Bank for its continued support.

Want to become a KHA sponsor? Contact Pam Kirchem at KHA (pkirchem@kyha.com).

The 2017-2019 State Health Plan will go into effect on January 5, 2018. The Office of Health Policy issued the proposed State Health Plan in July and the final State Health Plan with the statement of consideration was released on October 13.

Overall, KHA and its member hospitals were pleased with the outcome. The Cabinet accepted KHA’s comments to allow hospitals to establish home health services if they can demonstrate difficulty in placing patients. Unfortunately, no changes were made to the PRTF Level II criteria; although, when KHA staff met with the Cabinet, they acknowledged the need for more access to this level of care and indicated a desire to continue to work on this with KHA.

The Cabinet modified, but retained, the exception to the nursing facility bed need formula to allow for the development of short-term post acute care/rehabilitation services, as a pilot program – two in urban areas and two in rural areas. The beds will be licensed as NF, which would permit...

Make, manage and automate your hospital’s payments, from invoice capture and workflow approval to payment optimization, with CommerceVantage^® – a comprehensive suite of AP solutions.

Powered by Commerce Bank, a national leader in payments and revenue cycle management, CommerceVantage^® combines the latest in accounts payable technology to create process efficiencies and revenue share opportunities with secure payment programs.

• Eliminate paper invoices
• Enhance process efficiencies
• Gain real-time visibility into your payment process
• Earn monthly revenue share

For more information on how Commerce Bank can help your facility or system, please contact Pam Kirchem at KHA (pkirchem@kyha.com).

On or about December 20, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) will likely update its Hospital Compare website with new star ratings and release the list of hospitals receiving Hospital-Acquired Condition (HAC) penalties for fiscal year (FY) 2018. Corrections to the star ratings calculations likely mean that significantly fewer hospitals will receive a three-star rating this year than last. As a result, many more hospitals will receive four or five stars, while additional hospitals will receive one or two-star ratings. In the past, release of the HAC payment penalty list and the star ratings have generated media attention. 

AHA released a Quality Advisory yesterday to help organizations prepare for the public release of the star ratings and...