Articles

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) “Pathways to Success” rule for Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) has five goals: accountability, competition, engagement, integrity, and quality, all aimed at improving patient care. But as today’s ACOs assume more down-side risk, and seek to regain their equilibrium from the upheaval of the COVID-19 pandemic, they must adopt a sixth objective – increasing shared savings in their network. Where do ACOs go to find those additional savings? Each part of their network is already focused on providing the highest quality patient care while keeping costs to a minimum. However, are the ACOs keeping close...read more

Today’s Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) continue to earn shared savings under the Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP)…but it’s not as easy as it once was. Some ACOs are turning to risk-sharing strategies or improved post-acute care (PAC) clinical standardization to expand their MSSP success. Yet, there’s still more they can do to lower costs and increase quality of care for Medicare beneficiaries – and thus grow their own rewards. Let’s take a brief look at the history of the MSSP, how it has evolved, and how access to real-time PAC patient data can take shared savings to the next level....read more

When the World Health Organization (WHO) designated 2020 the International Year of the Nurse and Midwife, in recognition of Florence Nightingale’s 200th birthday, it never could have imagined what nurses around the world would experience during that year. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, WHO has extended the Year of the Nurse into 2021. Today, our country is celebrating National Nurses Day and kicking off National Nurses Week…which has been expanded to the entire month of May![1] Nurses are front and center every day at Real Time Medical Systems, starting with the many nurses we support with our clinical...read more

With the prioritization of COVID-19 vaccinations in nursing facilities since late December, facilities nationwide have seen a significant decline in both new cases and deaths among resident populations. Though the decline of COVID-19 cases is very encouraging, many skilled nursing facilities are now facing widespread systemic issues that the pandemic exposed. Ongoing and dynamic infection prevention and control programs, along with strong facility policies and procedures for care, remain imperative for successful operations on many metric scales. Staffing ratios and lower occupancy rates also create business challenges that must be reviewed and quantified daily. In light of the extreme pressures facilities...read more