There are 12,400 home health agencies which provided care to 4.9 million patients in 2014, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In light of efforts to keep patients from being readmitted to hospitals, and to keep the hospital stays they do undergo as short as possible,...Read More »
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7 The creepy-crawlies: Avoiding CDI scope creep
11 The buck stops here: CDI escalation policies
16 Tips from the frontlines for physician engagementRead More »
By Melissa Varnavas
There’s a photo of my mom and dad from the winter of 2015, snow piles towering over them on either side. That year the Boston area received blizzard after blizzard. We still call it (with a nod to J.K. Rowling) the winter-that-shall-not-be-named.
Scope creep is “really the whole sentiment that since we’re already in the record, we can do more and more,” says Lara Faustino, RN, BSN, CCDS, a CDI specialist at Boston Medical Center. “It happened gradually for us.”
As CDI programs mature, they move away from the easy-...Read More »
Those who’ve worked in CDI or healthcare compliance for any length of time typically prepare themselves for the annual October release of the OIG's Work Plan. The thousand-plus-page document outlines OIG...Read More »
Every CDI program needs to respond to certain common physician criticisms and questions: everything from physician complaints about their lack of time to answer queries, to the accusation that CDI is only about the money.
Veteran CDI professionals often develop rote responses to these...Read More »
