and scope. Some feel that some of the survey's 37 questions are
intrusive of patients' personal information. In addition to asking
patients about nausea, bleeding, pain, infection and discharge
instructions, the satisfaction survey borders on data mining, ask-
ing patients to rate their overall mental or emotional health and if
they speak a language other than English at home. If the patient
answers "yes," then the patient is asked to name the language.
• Only by phone or by snail mail. The vendor will administer
the survey to your patients by telephone, mail or mail with tele-
phone follow-up — no email surveys, at least not yet — and then
submit the data to CMS. In the digital age, it makes "absolutely
no sense" that there's no electronic option, says anesthesiologist
David Shapiro, MD, CASC, past president of the Ambulatory
Surgery Center Association (ASCA).
"We continue to encourage CMS to keep the survey voluntary
until there is an electronic option and the survey is shortened,
both of which would significantly reduce the cost burden to our
facilities and make it easier for our patients to complete,"says
Kara Newbury, JD, regulatory counsel for ASCA.
Those facilities that want to participate can do so voluntarily.
Many hope OAS CAHPS is overhauled before they're forced to
participate — or risk forfeiting 2% of their Medicare reimburse-
ment as a penalty.
"The ASC Association put a lot of effort in communicating with
CMS about the program's perceived deficiencies," says Dr.
Shapiro. "There were a lot of issues with the proposed survey
and we'd like to see CMS address those concerns. We're heart-
ened that CMS responded by implementing the delay."
— Daniel Cook
J A N U A R Y 2 0 1 8 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y. N E T • 2 5
