PSOs are designed to help clinicians, hospitals, and other healthcare organizations
improve patient care by encouraging them to conduct quality and safety analyses.
Through federal protections of legal privilege and confidentiality authorized by
the Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act of 2005, PSOs foster a culture of
safety and create a secure environment where providers can collect and analyze data
to identify and reduce the risks and hazards associated with patient care.
The major focus of the THPSO is to conduct continuous quality improvement (CQI)
activities.
The data generated from the CQI activities will allow us to create clinical best
practice recommendations, which will ultimately enhance care delivery models and
lower professional liability insurance (PLI) risks. Additionally, the THPSO provides
a wall of protection for D&Y/TeamHealth affiliated Providers so they can participate
in blinded CQI activities without fear of discoverability. This protection is superior
to that afforded by hospital CQI processes.
The THPSO will review multiple sources of material, including claims data, billing
demographics, and patient clinical records, in order to analyze issues and develop
CQI initiatives to enhance patient safety and mitigate risk. The THPSO will most
likely only have access to this data if the Provider is working on assignment for
a TeamHealth affiliate. If you have any question about whether your assignment is
for a TeamHealth affiliate, please ask your D&Y Recruiter or Staffing Coordinator.
Yes. For a Provider to engage in the confidential CQI initiatives or to participate
in the learning processes provided by the THPSO, the Provider must be a member of
the THPSO and must agree to maintain the confidentiality provided therein. We believe
that THPSO membership will improve patient safety and will have a positive effect
on D&Y and TeamHealth’s professional liability risk. Therefore, the insurer
for TeamHealth’s PLI has required that all its insured Providers be members of the
THPSO in order to receive its benefits.
Membership is a one-time enrollment process. D&Y will send you a “Patient Safety
Organization: Provider Agreement”. You will need to review this document, sign,
and return it to your D&Y Recruiter or D&Y Credentialer. Note that this
Agreement is by and between you and the THPSO. It is non-negotiable and D&Y
does not have the ability to make any modifications or revisions to this document.
No. Providers will not be charged a membership fee to join or maintain membership
in the THPSO
Once you sign the “Provider Safety Organization: Provider Agreement,” your membership
in the THPSO will be in effect as long as you have an effective contract with D&Y
or until the THPSO delivers written notice of termination to you.
As a D&Y/TH Provider, your obligations are stated in the “Patient Safety Organization:
Provider Agreement”.
They are as follows:
• Participate in or cooperate with PSO initiatives to improve the quality, safety
and outcomes of patient care.
• Participate in or cooperate with the PSO’s collection of data including, but not
limited to, adverse safety events evaluated by the PSO as confidential Patient Safety
Work Product so that the PSO can provide Patient Safety Work Product to Provider
and other providers of the PSO.
• Maintain the confidentiality of all Patient Safety Work Product and not disclose
such information to any third parties who are not affiliated with the PSO or part
of PSO’s work force.
• Any Patient Safety Work Product (PSWP) that the provider possesses be designated
as PSO PSWP and kept separate from any other materials maintained by the provider.
• Receive, evaluate and implement feed-back provided from the PSO about Patient
Safety Work Product.
• Comply with PSO corrective action plans.
• Abide by all applicable rules and regulations established by the Act, including
the maintenance of the confidentiality of all Patient Safety Work Product.
• Maintain the strict confidentiality of all Patient Safety Work Product and not
disclose the same to any third parties who are not providers with the PSO or part
of PSO’s work force, except as permitted by the Act. PSO may however disclose to
third parties that Provider is party to this Agreement, and if this Agreement is
terminated, the fact of such termination,
• Provide guidance and direct feedback to Provider and other contracting providers
of the PSO’s Patient Safety Work product including, but not limited to, analysis
of adverse events, medical errors and “near misses,” broad statistical pattern analyses
drawing upon data from two or more providers, and
• Assist health care professionals and organizations in identifying and/or undertaking
quality improvement initiatives to minimize patient risk.
Without the member’s specific written authorization, no member-specific information
or THPSO patient safety work product may be shared with anyone outside of the THPSO.
Be assured that any THPSO document that identifies a member will not be shared with
D&Y, D&Y’s/TeamHealth’s insurance program, TeamHealth’s regional division offices,
or TeamHealth Human Resources. The CQI data that is shared with TeamHealth affiliates
will not include the identity of any of the Providers in the material.
With some statutory exceptions, the only way THPSO material can be shared outside
of the THPSO is under the limited circumstances in which that material has been
scrubbed so that no personal identifiers, including patient and Provider identification
are present, and its removal from the THPSO’s protection has been approved at the
highest level. Once “scrubbed” material leaves the THPSO, it loses its confidentiality
protection.
Each Provider will be assigned an encrypted, randomly generated identification number
so that anonymity can be preserved. All THPSO members and workforce will be trained
in the importance of maintaining the confidentiality protections of the PSO. In
addition, any person who discloses member identifiable confidential PSO information
may be subject to significant fines, imposed by the federal agency that enforces
HIPAA compliance,
The THPSO will be able to provider Provider-specific feedback to individual Providers,
without revealing that member’s identity to those not part of the THPSO.
Patient safety work product that identifies a Provider will only be disclosed if
the Provider has agreed in writing to the specific disclosure.
The Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality (AHRQ), a division of the Department
of Health and Human Services and the lead Federal agency for patient safety research,
administers the provisions of the Patient Safety Act dealing with PSO operations.
http://www.pso.ahrq.gov