The Hospice Care Index Technical Report is now available . This technical report provides context and descriptive analyses for a new Hospice Quality Reporting Program (HQRP) Quality Measure, the Hospice Care Index (HCI).
HCI captures care processes occurring throughout the hospice stay, between admission and discharge. The HCI is a single measure comprising ten indicators calculated from Medicare claims data.
The index design of the HCI simultaneously monitors all ten indicators. Collectively these indicators represent different aspects of hospice service and thereby characterize hospices comprehensively, rather than on just a single care dimension. Each indicator equally affects the single HCI score, reflecting the equal importance of each aspect of care delivered from admission to discharge.
List of HCI Indicators:
- Continuous Home Care (CHC) or General Inpatient (GIP) Provided
- Gaps in Skilled Nursing Visits
- Early Live Discharges
- Late Live Discharges
- Burdensome Transitions (Type 1) – Live Discharges from Hospice Followed by Hospitalization and Subsequent Hospice Readmission
- Burdensome Transitions (Type 2) – Live Discharges from Hospice Followed by Hospitalization with the Patient Dying in the Hospital
- Per-beneficiary Medicare Spending
- Skilled Nursing Care Minutes per Routine Home Care (RHC) Day
- Skilled Nursing Minutes on Weekends
- Visits Near Death
Read more:
- CMS: Hospice Care Index Technical Report (PDF). July 2022.