CMS Removes Measure From Hospital Outpatient Quality Reporting - Aug. 21, 2012

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued a memorandum on Aug. 13 announcing the removal of the OP-16 measure from the Hospital Outpatient Quality Reporting (OQR) Program. OP-16 addresses the receipt of Troponin results for patients with acute myocardial infarction or chest pains within 60 minutes of arrival to the emergency department. Following a July U.S. Food and Drug Administration recall of several testing kits that provide Troponin results, CMS cited patient safety concerns as cause for the removal of this measure. CMS has asked for all chart abstractions of OP-16 to cease immediately. Due to system constraints, CMS asks hospitals to populate the measure with a meaningless number, as a blank value could cause the data to be rejected. CMS will not use data collected for this measure in calendar year (CY) 2013 payment determinations.