The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) collects information about Medicare beneficiaries’ experiences with, and ratings of, Medicare Advantage (MA-only) plans, Medicare Advantage Prescription Drug (MA-PD) plans, and stand-alone Medicare Prescription Drug Plans (PDP) via surveys of beneficiaries.  The MA & PDP CAHPS Survey is administered annually to a large sample of MA & PDP beneficiaries asking questions about ease of getting needed care and seeing specialists, getting appointments and care quickly, doctors who communicate well, coordination of members’ health care services, health and/or drug plan provides information or help when members need it, ease of getting prescriptions filled, rating of health and/or drug plan, rating of health care quality, annual flu vaccine, and pneumonia vaccine.  CMS publicly reports the results of its of the MA-PDP CAHPS surveys, and is a component of determining quality payment bonuses.  (cms.gov)

Patient experience results are becoming increasingly tied to CMS financial incentives and public reporting in the form of Quality Bonus Payments and STAR Ratings.  To best prepare for your CAHPS requirements, Brenmor provides a variety of survey approaches to continuously identify, improve and monitor operational weaknesses down to the provider level.  Our robust aggregate and real-time reporting tools offer unique ways to distribute survey results that will drive accountability and engagement across all of your practices.

Many of the CMS patient experience surveys are in the Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS®) family of surveys. CAHPS surveys ask consumers and patients to report on and evaluate their health care experiences. Surveys cover topics important to consumers and focus on those aspects of quality that consumers are best qualified to assess.

The Star Ratings measures span five broad categories:

Outcomes  |  Intermediate Outcomes  |  Patient Experience  |  Access  |  Process