• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
  • Events
  • Articles
  • Contact
kentuckiana health collaborative 1

Kentuckiana Health Collaborative

Building a bridge to better health, better care and better value

  • About
    • Mission
    • Staff
    • Board of Directors
  • Strategies
    • Improve Healthcare Quality
    • Make Healthcare More Affordable
    • Build Healthier Communities
  • Initiatives
    • Community Measurement
    • COVID-19
    • Health Equity
    • Kentucky Core Healthcare Measures Set
    • National Hospital Price Transparency Study
    • Opioids and the Workplace
  • Members
    • About the Membership
    • Current Members
    • Member Resources
    • Member Portal
  • Join
Home / KHC News / Kentucky Core Healthcare Measures Set Finalized

Kentucky Core Healthcare Measures Set Finalized

Filed Under: KHC News, Measurement June 27, 2018, Stephanie Clouser

Stephanie Clouser

Nine months. That’s how long it takes to develop and birth a baby.

It’s also how KHC co-director Randa Deaton has described the KHC’s initiative with Kentucky Department for Medicaid Services to create a core set of primary healthcare measures, which began approximately nine months ago and was completed last night.

Folks, reducing from 89 incented measures to a set of 32 definitely felt very much like birthing a baby.

The journey to create a core measures set for the Commonwealth of Kentucky began last summer, when KHC co-directors Randa Deaton and Teresa Couts met with then-Secretary of the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services Vickie Yates Brown Glisson and discovered a mutual interest in addressing measurement mayhem through alignment. Thus began a partnership with the Kentucky Department for Medicaid Services (KDMS) to create a core healthcare measures set for Kentucky’s primary care providers, with the ultimate goal of aligning the priorities of Medicare, Medicaid, and commercial insurers. The project was announced in September by Glisson, and soon after, four subcommittees formed in key areas got to work, evaluating national core measures sets, Kentucky performance data, organizational healthcare priorities, and more.

This spring, subcommittees presented their recommendations to a large oversight committee, which spent the next few months reviewing the recommendations and confirming the final set. The Kentucky Performance Measures Alignment Committee (PMAC) oversight committee and four subcommittees were made up of more than 70 expert volunteers from varying backgrounds and geographic regions. These various stakeholders, some of which have competing incentives, have spent the last several months engaging in consensus-based discussions, often coming to some surprising agreements. Because we created a “limited” set, to reduce complexity and improve focus, committee members have had to make tough decisions to select only the measures that have significant impact.

KENTUCKY CORE HEALTHCARE MEASURES SET

The resulting final set includes 32 primary care measures, 21 of which are considered high priority, focused in the areas of prevention, pediatrics, chronic and acute care management, behavioral health, and cost/utilization. This is less than half of the number of 89 currently incented measures in Kentucky by various programs. Many of the measures are ones that anyone with a healthcare measurement background would quickly recognize. But our PMAC committee also chose – wisely, in my opinion – a few “stretch measures” that might have a few more challenges to them but ultimately are important to impacting the health of Kentuckians.

This list of leading quality indicators is but a start toward driving meaningful measurement in Kentucky. PMAC members also got a chance to identify areas of development for future iterations of the measures set. Sometimes this involved listing existing measures that need improvement or establishment and sometimes these were blanket statements identifying the need to develop a measure in a particular area.

NEXT STEPS

The confirmation of the KCHMS is not the end of PMAC. Now that the set has been finalized, there is new work to be done. We have planned multiple events around Kentucky Core Healthcare Measures Set (KCHMS), including a webinar on July 26 and an employer forum in October. Additionally, we now begin the process of working with organizations to adopt this core measures set and utilize it in contracting. You can find all the news related to PMAC here.

Thank you to everyone who participated in this initiative, whether by serving on or chairing a committee, taking meetings with KHC staff members, securing meeting space, or providing expertise on measure nuances. Now let’s put this set to use. When we focus on everything, we focus on nothing. However, when we focus on the right things, we can drive meaningful change.

View the Kentucky Core Healthcare Measures Set

Similar Articles

dsBuffer.bmp

KHC Releases 2020 Annual Report

January 12, 2021

“If we thought 2018 was historic, we weren’t at all prepared for what 2019 would bring!” I couldn’t help but chuckle when reading this phrase from a January 2020 blog post written by KHC Data Scientist Stephanie Clouser announcing the release of our 2019 annual report. At that time last […]

Read More
KHC Logo Blog Featured Photo 1

KHC Announces 2021 Board of Directors

January 11, 2021

The KHC saw many changes in 2021, including operating for the first time without the infrastructure and leadership of the UAW/Ford Community Healthcare Initiative. As a result, new bylaws were created for the organization, including new guidelines for KHC leadership. What was previously the Executive Committee is now the Board […]

Read More
2020 Roundup

2020 Round-up: Top Stories from the KHC

January 5, 2021

Well, 2020 certainly was a year. I think that’s the only way to state it without being negative, and this is a new year, so I want to leave the negativity where it belongs in 2020. But as challenging as last year was, at the KHC, we had much to […]

Read More

Get the latest articles and updates.

Our email newsletter shares our latest research, initiatives and events.

Footer

  • About
    • Mission
    • Staff
    • Board of Directors
  • Members
    • About the Membership
    • Member Resources
    • Join the Membership
  • Strategies
    • Improve Healthcare Quality
    • Make Healthcare More Affordable
    • Build Healthier Communities
  • Initiatives
    • Community Measurement
    • COVID-19
    • Health Equity
    • National Hospital Price Transparency Study
    • Opioids and the Workplace
  • Connect
    • Events
    • Articles
    • Contact
khc logo blue

(502) 238-3603
1415 Bardstown Road, Mailbox 19, Louisville, KY 40204

Copyright © 2021 · Kentuckiana Health Collaborative · Privacy Policy · Sitemap · Stop Animations

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you are happy with it.Ok