Shapiro, MD, vice chairman of the ASC Quality Collaboration.
Mr. Weiss and Cecilia Kronawitter, a surgery center developer, are
harsh critics of OAS CAHPS.
"The expense of mandatory reporting and the 2% penalty for non-
compliance are just the start of the true cost of OAS CAHPS," they
say. "The rest is an instantiation of President Reagan's quip that the 9
most terrifying words in the English language are, I'm from the gov-
ernment and I'm here to help."
They find fault with who'll conduct the patient surveys: not you or
someone from your staff but a CMS-approved vendor who'll charge
you anywhere from $10 to $25 per completed survey.
"You must give the vendor your patients' personal information. The
vendor's staff will contact your patients and conduct the survey for
you," they say. "What a vendor might charge, and how they might
charge — for each completed survey, for each partially completed
one, for each phone call? — is determined by that particular vendor."
What's most troubling to Mr. Weiss and Ms. Kronawitter is the highly
personal, non-medical nature of more than one-third of the 37 ques-
tions.
• In general, how would you rate your overall mental or emotional
health?
• Do you speak a language other than English at home? If the
patient answers "yes," then the patient must name the language.
"These questions aren't about your ASC, they're about data mining
your patients," they say. "How many patients will actually give up all
of the required information in order to have their responses count as
completed surveys?"
The real worry is if quality reporting becomes too burdensome, if it
takes too much of your time and your money, then some could decide
not to participate and concede the 2% reimbursement update — espe-
J U L Y 2 0 1 7 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y. N E T • 7
