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Overview
The intent of the CAHPS® Hospital Survey (also
known as Hospital CAHPS or HCAHPS) is to
provide a standardized survey instrument and data
collection methodology for measuring patients'
perspectives on hospital care. While many
hospitals collect information on patient
satisfaction, there is no national standard for
collecting or publicly reporting this information
that would enable valid comparisons to be made
across all hospitals. In order to make "apples
to apples" comparisons to support consumer choice,
it is necessary to introduce a standard measurement
approach. HCAHPS is a core set
of questions that can be combined with a customized
set of hospital-specific items. HCAHPS is
meant to complement the data hospitals currently
collect to support improvements in internal customer
services and related activities.
The first goal of the survey is designed to
produce comparable data on the patient's perspective
on care that allows objective and meaningful
comparisons between hospitals on issues that are
important to consumers. Second, public
reporting of the survey results is designed to
create incentives for hospitals to improve their
quality of care. Third, public reporting will
serve to enhance public accountability in health
care.
HCAHPS Development
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
(CMS) has partnered with the Agency for Healthcare
Research and Quality (AHRQ), another agency in the
Department of Health and Human Services, to develop
HCAHPS.
The HCAHPS survey is composed of 27
items: 18 items that encompass
critical aspects of the hospital experience
(communication with doctors/nurses, responsiveness of hospital staff,
cleanliness/quietness of the hospital, pain
control, communication about medicines, and
discharge information); 4 items to screen patients
to appropriate items; 3 items to adjust for the
mix of patients across hospitals; and 2 items to
support congressionally-mandated reports.
| Quick Facts about HCAHPS: |
- HCAHPS will result in the first
truly national, standardized, publicly
reported benchmark of hospital patients'
perspectives of their care.
- Participation in HCAHPS is
voluntary; there are no financial
incentives or disincentives tied to
the survey.
- All short-term, acute care,
non-specialty hospitals are invited
to participate.
- Hospitals may use use an
approved survey vendor.
- Hospitals may either integrate
the HCAHPS items within their own
patient satisfaction survey, or
implement HCAHPS as a separate
survey.
- The survey can be conducted by
mail, telephone, mail with telephone
follow-up, or active IVR.
- Survey is conducted from a
random sample of live discharges who
were 18 and older at admission, had
an over-night stay, and had a
non-psychiatric diagnosis.
- Patients are surveyed on a
monthly basis and data submitted to
CMS on a monthly or quarterly basis.
- Hospitals are asked to provide
300 completed surveys per year; for
smaller hospitals, as few as 100
completed surveys are needed for
public reporting.
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For More Information
To learn more about HCAHPS, please contact
us. We look forward to
helping you!
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