he Annual Facility Survey conducted, by HCFA, is the source of all the results presented in this chapter. Note that the data for 1994 are preliminary and may be subject to minor revisions. The facility survey contains summary data on facility characteristics for all Medicare approved dialysis and transplant units reporting patients at the end of the year. The Annual Facility Survey is designed ...

The Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) survey is a publicly reported tool that measures patient satisfaction. As both patients and Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) reimbursement rely on survey results as a metric of quality of care, we reviewed the current literature to determine if patient satisfaction correlates with quality, safety, or pat...

OBJECTIVE To apply the economic theory of economies of scope to the home healthcare industry. DATA SOURCES Data on 488 observations obtained from the Cost Report (HCFA Form 1728-86) of all Connecticut state-licensed, Medicare-certified home health agencies. STUDY DESIGN The Cost Report was the primary source of data for this study. Information on total cost, scope, and other related factors...

The study presented in this article addresses the impact of the 2008 nonpayment policy of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) on catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs) from the perspective of infection preventionists. With rich qualitative data, it sheds light on the day-to-day impact of this recent health policy on CAUTI prevention.

Payments to physicians absorb the second largest share of the health care dollar in the United States. In 1979, the share was 19 percent of the total, or $40.6 billion (Gibson, 1980). The Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) alone spent $8.6 billion for physician services, representing approximately 16 percent of all public funds disbursed under HCFA programs. This paper presents an over...

The Medicare hospice benefit prospectively reimburses hospices based on the inpatient status of the patient, whether or not the patient is at home, and whether the patient is receiving round-the-clock nursing. Using national Hospice Study data, two case-mix adjusters based on patient functioning and living arrangement were found to be significantly related to per diem cost. These were tested by...

This overview ties together the various articles by relating them to the current debate on whether, and how, the Medicare program can add outpatient drugs as a covered benefit. The unifying theme for most of the articles is that they outline possible ways of administering a drug benefit and discuss policy issues that will arise, based on Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) experiences o...

In the US prescription drug costs are rising faster than any other component of health care expenditures, and show no signs of slowing. Spending on prescription drugs has been estimated by the Health Care Finance Administration (HCFA) to be rising by approximately 12% per year, more than twice the rate for national health care expenditures (5.1%). Factors driving the rise in prescription drug c...

Measuring severity of illness within diagnosis-related groups (DRGs) has become increasingly important because of the growing need to compare outcomes across providers. In response to these needs, the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) has developed a DRG-based severity system as a refinement to its current Medicare DRG structure. As a result of this recent HCFA research, all-payer sev...