CMI without COVID
As we approach (hopefully!!) the end of the pandemic, some of us are thinking about our CMI and KPIs and the impact COVID has had on those metrics. We are asking ourselves, have we actually met our goals? Did COVID's false inflation mask other opportunities? How would we define CMI without COVID? We have tossed around pulling out just the accounts with the Resp DRGs (COVID as PDx) vs. pulling out all accounts with active COVID infection to capture those additional sepsis, PNA, etc. vs. calculating 2019 Resp, Sepsis and/or PNA accounts, compare to the same for 2020-2022 and subtract the difference (essentially extrapolating pre-COVID #s as an estimation of 2020-22 data.)
What are your thoughts? Specifically, how would your organization define CMI without COVID? Has anyone seen any industry publications around these questions? My search didn't yield anything substantial.
Comments
Greetings, I think that is a great question and yes, that is the way we have approached looking at CMI since February of this year. COVID brought us more patients requiring tracheostomies and ECMO like never before. Since moving forward, CMI has decreased. I think the important piece to monitor is also the surgery volumes as that has a direct correlation on CMI and/or transplants if you offer that service.
The data we look at when benchmarking our facilities relates to including or excluding COVID. Those 2 years are hard to use for comparison and can't give you accurate information.