Developing an Effective Quality Assurance Program

With the passing of the Affordable Care Act in 2010, the U.S. Government will now require a compliance program to be instituted in each nursing home by the end of 2013 and a Quality Assurance and Performance Improvement (QAPI) program soon after. In July 2011, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released their “5 Elements of QAPI” to be used by nursing homes as a framework when creating their own QAPI program.

This research brief contains valuable information about creating an effective QAPI program, including the makeup of the Quality Assurance committee and how to protect its discovery and waiver of privilege, how to perform root cause analysis and provide effective training across a facility.