SQUID2
Development of Staffing Quality Measures – Phase I: Continuation

Funded by: Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
Subcontract From: Colorado Foundation for Medical Care
Project Period: 07/06 - 03/08

Project Summary: Serious problems with nursing home patient care have been attributed in part to inadequate nurse staffing. Nursing homes’ nurse staffing ratios are posted on CMS’s website to allow consumers to compare nursing homes to each other, though the data are less than ideal. Payroll data can be used to calculate several standardized, auditable, and timely measures of nursing home staffing. The purpose of this study is to use facility payroll records to construct a broader array of nurse staffing measures that better captures staffing quality and are appropriate for use in public reporting and quality monitoring.

Eight corporations provided payroll, census, and personnel records from their data systems covering 1453 individual nursing homes in 48 states for CY 2003. Staffing ratios, staff mix, percent full-time employees, turnover/retention, percent short-time employees, and tenure measures were constructed by staff category and for combined nursing staff. The relationship between these staffing measures and CMS’s post-acute care and chronic care QMs and will be assessed. Additionally, the staffing measures will be compared to other measures of facility quality such as community discharge rates and rehospitalization rates. Various forms of the staffing measures will be tested to determine which constructs are best suited for public reporting. Following on-site feasibility testing of current data extraction specifications, final data and reporting specifications will be prepared.

Key Staff: Kramer, Palmer, Donelan-McCall, Eilertsen, Côté, Fish, Mattivi, O'Brien, Romaglia

Reports to Date:

Donelan-McCall N, and Project Investigators at the University of Colorado Denver Division of Health Care Policy and Research, and the Colorado Foundation for Medical Care. Development of Staffing Quality Measures Phase I Continuation - Documentation of Payroll Data Specifications. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Baltimore, Maryland. January 16, 2007.

Donelan-McCall N, Eilertsen T, Kramer A. Development of Staffing Quality Measures Phase I Continuation - Task 2: Relationship Between Staffing Measures and Community Discharge and Rehospitalization Outcome Measures for Short Stay Patients. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Baltimore, Maryland. April 30, 2007.

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