1. Join Us at EDPMA's Membership Reception at ACEP Scientific Assembly 
2. Webinar Tomorrow: Improving Sepsis Care in the Emergency Department
3. Informal Review Process for PQRS 
4. Ten Days Until the ICD-10 Transition:  CMS Resources Available 
5. Urgent Matters Special Event on Increasing Value in the ED
6. Participate in the EM Day of Service in September
7. EDPMA New Member Spotlight
8. Save the Date: Solutions Summit 2016
9. EDPMA Committee Highlights

Ten Days Until the ICD-10 Transition: 
CMS  Resources Available

The transition to ICD-10 is only ten days away!  Last week, CMS reminded providers that it has made many ICD-10 resources available including the following:

ICD-10 requires certain documentation.  CMS released the following Clinical Concept Guides.  

• Family Practice
• Internal Medicine
• Cardiology
• OB/GYN
• Orthopedics
• Pediatrics

 

Visit the CMS ICD-10 website and Roadto10.org for the latest news and resources to help you prepare, including the ICD-10 Quick Start Guide. Sign up for CMS ICD-10 Email Updates. 

Urgent Matters Special Event on 

Increasing  Value in the ED 

EDPMA is a member of the Urgent Matters Editorial Board and contributes webinars, newsletter articles, and other educational material to this important collaborative group.  As an EDPMA member, we encourage all of you attending the ACEP Scientific Assembly in Boston, MA, to register for the Urgent Matters special pre-conference event called "Increasing Value in the Emergency Department: Innovations to Improve Cost and Quality." 

 

Date:		Sunday, October 25
Time:		12:30 pm - 5:30 pm
Cost:		$89 ACEP Members $139 Non-Members $69 Residents

 

This special session will focus on alternative payment models and how they will change how physicians and hospitals are reimbursed. Will emergency medicine be a key player in the value discussion? Come to this special pre-conference event to find out. The speakers will highlight innovations dedicated to increasing the value of emergency care and improving delivery systems. You'll be able to learn from expert faculty on how to develop, assess, and implement interventions that improve patient outcomes and the hospital's bottom line.  More about this program and speakers for this special pre-conference event is available here.   

Who should join the movement?

While driven by EM residents and medical students, all emergency healthcare providers are invited to participate! Emergency physicians, PA's nurses, paramedics and others involved in the emergency care of patients are invited to volunteer in communities across the country. 
 

What should we do and where?  
Volunteer in your own community. Decide where the needs are greatest and go into action! Here are some ideas to get you started:  

Partners in Improvement, LLC helps emergency medicine leaders with high level reviews of strategy and competition, new ideas for practice management, personnel issues, and tactical advice on IT, billing and coding. They offer expertise across a diverse range of skills including operations, executive coaching, and project management. Not only does Partners in Improvement perform assessments, they assist in implementing all recommendations and have a practice of sharing risk (i.e. consulting fees) to achieve agreed upon metric improvement.  Please visit http://partnersinimprovement.co/ to learn more about Partners In Improvement's services.

Excerpts from a conversation with Dan Kirkpatrick, Founder and Owner, Partners in Improvement:

My career in healthcare consulting started in a circuitous way through a big accounting firm where I worked in their healthcare division. Since then I have kept my toes in the field through personal consulting because I enjoyed it. Years later, the physician group I worked for went through a merger. It was then that I decided it was time to go independent. The name for my business actually came from a client!

I had attended EDPMA's Solutions Summit five or six years ago in Las Vegas and connected with a number of members. We kept in touch over the years so I was able to keep up with EDPMA activities. After formally launching Partners in Improvement, I reviewed multiple associations to determine which to join. EDPMA made the cut because it is more aligned with my consultancy and practice management. The association keeps a pulse on events affecting the industry such as reimbursement, licensures and freestanding emergency centers. They then share that information through EDPMA newsletters and news alerts.

At this year's conference, I sat in on two committee sessions. It was good to see the cordial relationship among peers. I've noticed that this willingness to support and help others in the industry is more visible than at other organizations. There is a receptiveness to being available and inclination to share information.

One of the challenges for independent groups is having to more urgently meet the financial equation of its members. They are struggling to staff their contracts. The hospitals also want their ED partners to be more involved with issues such as readmissions, patient flow and home health. And changes in reimbursement mean the way groups made money in the past is going to change as different risk sharing models surface. The history and experience of EDPMA members are a valuable resource. They are experimenting with various models of organization and payment to help sort out what works and what does not.

The real work at EDPMA is done at the committee level. Committee members work together in a variety of ways including:

Experts work side-by-side with newcomers, new leaders shine, and everyone's contribution is greatly appreciated.  Many members report that insight shared on committee conference calls is one of the most important and unique benefits of their EDPMA membership.  

 

We invite you to join one of EDPMA's committees.  Information about each committee is available here.

 

Membership Committee Update: