LHCSA Statistical Report Revisions
During the fourth meeting of the Licensed Home Care Services Agency (LHCSA) Statistical Report Workgroup held earlier this week, the Department of Health (DOH) reviewed prior meeting discussions and outlined the many changes they are making to the 2017 report based on stakeholder feedback. Some reporting elements are being streamlined and combined, while some questions are being added to gather key staffing information. The slides from the meeting list schedule-by-schedule changes and are available here.
Going forward, LHCSA Statistical Reports will be submitted using a universal data collection system that providers will access through the Health Commerce System (HCS). DOH demonstrated the software, which has the same look as Microsoft Excel. Users will download the free software, run it locally on their computer to complete the report, then upload the report once completed.
As DOH walked through the revised report, members of the workgroup provided additional suggestions for final edits. The new schedule being added to collect workforce information prompted the most discussion. Despite the best efforts of workgroup members and DOH staff, the challenge of collecting the number of cases that agencies are not able to accept due to staffing limitations remains unresolved. Most of the data collection approaches would result in counting the same cases across different agencies. DOH will investigate the feasibility of collecting this data from referral and payer sources but is interested in any additional recommendations on how best to compile this information.
DOH will be seeking volunteers to help test the new report in February 2018 and will present a guidance webinar prior to the release of the restructured report and software.
DOH also provided a status update of 2016 report filings. Staff noted that one day before the Nov. 10th filing deadline, more than 40 percent of agencies had not filed their 2016 reports. The system will remain open so that those needing to file are able to do so, at least until the end of this week (i.e., Nov. 17th). DOH recorded a webinar providing guidance on completing the 2016 report that is available on the HCS. Agencies that fail to file the report are subject to fines and will not have any ownership change requests they may submit reviewed.
Contact: Darius Kirstein, dkirstein@leadingageny.org, 518-867-8841