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The federal government's Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
(CMS) and Premier Inc., a national alliance of nonprofit hospitals,
conduct the nationwide Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration (HQID)
project.
In the second year of the three-year project, ALMH was rated in
the top 10 percent among 266 top-performing hospitals for their care
of patients with heart failure and in the top 20 percent for the
care of pneumonia patients.
Based on these second-year scores, ALMH will receive a bonus
payment of $10,698 from CMS. ALMH earned $7,966 for its care of
heart failure patients during the project's first year.
"The demonstration project compares our quality performance and
cost of care for specific clinical conditions with those of other
participating hospitals, using nationally accepted, standard
performance measures," said ALMH president and CEO Dolan Dalpoas.
"We are participating in the Hospital Quality Incentive
Demonstration project because we believe that best practice and
higher quality care improves treatment results for patients and
reduces overall healthcare costs."
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 ALMH was one of the first hospitals in the nation to sign up for
the program in 2003. Participating hospitals volunteered to have
their quality data for high-volume clinical conditions analyzed in a
standard way. Hospitals in the top 10 percent for each of the
clinical conditions are paid a 2 percent bonus on their Medicare DRG
(diagnosis-related group) payments; hospitals in the second 10
percent receive a 1 percent bonus.
"For over a decade, Premier has been committed to working with
hospitals to improve clinical quality and patient outcomes while
safely reducing costs," said Richard Norling, president and CEO of
Premier Inc. "The findings from the first two years of the HQID
project clearly show that the project is having a positive impact on
the quality of care in our nation's hospitals and on the lives of
patients and their families."
Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital is a not-for-profit,
community-based hospital serving the people of Logan and eastern
Mason counties.
(Text copied from file received from Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital)
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