URAC Standards Open for Public Comment

URAC has released proposed standard revisions for public comment. Revisions have been made to the following standards:

- Health Plan, version 7.0
- Health Network, version 7.0
- Provider Credentialing, version 6.0
- Health Utilization Management, version 7.0
- Workers' Comp Utilization Management, version 6.0

The standards were revised to better align with the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 and performance reporting requirements.

URAC is accepting comments through February 14, 2011.

To review the proposed changes and information on submitting comments, click here:
http://www.urac.org/publiccomment/HPNetwrkPCUMPublicComment.html

CMS Extends TJC's Telemedicine Hospital Standards

Hospitals and Critical Access Hospitals do not have to make changes to implement new telemedicine credentialing and privileging elements of performance by a July 15, 2010 deadline, says The Joint Commission (TJC). The deadline for implementing the new elements of performance has been pushed to March 2011.

TJC had issued new elements of performance which were in compliance with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' (CMS) requirements for telemedicine services. The CMS requirements currently disallow the "credentialing by proxy" system that is supported by The Joint Commission's current standards. The "credentialing by proxy" system is intended to support access to telemedicine services by allowing the hospital where the patient is located, to rely on the credentialing and privileging data of a hospital where the provider is currently privileged in making its own decisions on that provider.

CMS has issued a proposed rule that would make the CMS telemedicine requirements in accordance with TJC's "credentialing by proxy" system. For this reason, CMS allowed TJC to delay implementation of the new elements of performance that are aligned with the current CMS CoPs until March 2011.


Source: The Joint Commission
http://www.jointcommission.org/AccreditationPrograms/Hospitals/telemed_requirements_hap_cah_delayed.htm

Final Revisions to 2010 AAAHC Standards Released

The Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Healthcare (AAAHC) has released the final revisions to its 2010 standards, which now include a chapter on Infection Control.

Along with the new revisions, AAAHC has released the following note:

"Organizations submitting an Application for Survey to AAAHC on or before February 26, 2010 and that are surveyed on or before June 30, 2010, will be surveyed according to 2009 standards. Organizations submitting an Application for Survey on or after March 1, 2010 and/or are surveyed after June 30, 2010, will be surveyed according to 2010 standards."

The AAAHC has been granted deemed status by CMS for Ambulatory Surgery Centers.

The 2010 standards revisions can be found here:
http://www.aaahc.org/eweb/docs/Standards%20revisions%20for%202010.pdf.


Source: AAAHC

TJC Accreditation Requirements Available for Pre-Publication Review

The Joint Commission has released the 2010 standards revisions for pre-publication review. Revisions for all accreditation programs will be available online until December 1, 2009.

Questions from accredited organizations can be submitted to the Standards Interpretation Group at (630) 792-5900 or via the online form.

To review the 2010 revisions, click here:
http://www.jointcommission.org/Standards/Pre-PublicationStandards/.


Source: The Joint Commission