This is a friendly reminder that the deadline for ICH CAHPS Survey vendors to submit the annual Quality Assurance Plan (QAP) is 11:59 PM Eastern Time on March 31, 2019.

The QAP must describe how the survey vendor will implement, comply with, and provide oversight of all survey and data processing activities associated with the ICH CAHPS Survey. To ensure prompt review and acceptance of your Annual QAP, please follow the procedures listed below:

Locate the version of your most recently approved QAP; that is, the version that was accepted by CMS and the Coordination Team in 2018. Make a copy of that version and accept all tracked changes, creating a clean copy of your QAP. Make all 2019 updates to your clean copy using track changes, so that your document reflects only the changes made since your most recently approved QAP. Make sure to include updates to your QAP if your organization has had changes in ICH CAHPS Survey personnel, changes to protocols or procedures, and/or changes...

This is a reminder that all in-center hemodialysis (ICH) facilities that are switching to a different ICH CAHPS Survey vendor to administer the 2019 ICH CAHPS Spring Survey must change their vendor authorization on the ICH CAHPS website by 5:00 PM Eastern Time TOMORROW, February 28, 2019.

Please note that ICH facilities must update the online vendor authorization only if the following applies.

Your facility is participating in the ICH CAHPS Survey for the first time during the 2019 Spring Survey; OR Your facility is switching to a different survey vendor to administer the 2019 ICH CAHPS Spring Survey; OR Your facility entered the 2018 Fall Survey as the last survey period for which the vendor would administer the survey when you originally submitted the authorization form. If your organization will continue to use the same ICH CAHPS Survey vendor that was used to administer the 2018 ICH CAHPS Fall Survey, you do not need to update the online vendor authorization form.

If...

Questions asked by participants during and after the February 14, 2019 ICH CAHPS Survey Vendor Update Webinar Training session and the answers provided are provided below.

Please note that there were no questions asked by participants during the February 13, 2019 Introduction to the ICH CAHPS Survey Webinar Training Session.

Vendor Update Training Session Topic: Survey Schedule:

Q: Do you require Quality Assurance Plan (QAP) submission of survey materials in English only?

A: Survey materials should be submitted as an appendix to your QAP for all languages that your organization is approved for.

Vendor Update Training Session Topic: Survey Administration:

Q: With the disposition rule described in slide 67 (Vendor Update Training Slide 67: If the nursing home staff member indicates they are not permitted to transfer the telephone interviewer to the sample patient’s room, and the telephone interviewer is unable to obtain a new phone number for the sample patient, then a...

This is a reminder to all in-center hemodialysis (ICH) facilities that the deadline for changing your vendor authorization on the ICH CAHPS Web site is 5:00 PM Eastern Time on February 28, 2019. Please note you must update the online vendor authorization only if the following applies:

Your facility is participating in the ICH CAHPS Survey for the first time during the 2019 Spring Survey; OR Your facility is switching to a different survey vendor to administer the 2019 ICH CAHPS Spring Survey; OR Your facility entered the 2018 Fall Survey as the last survey period for which the vendor would administer the survey when you originally submitted the authorization form. If your organization will continue to use the same ICH CAHPS Survey vendor that was used to administer the 2018 ICH CAHPS Fall Survey, you do not need to update the online vendor authorization form.

If any of the above statements apply to your facility, you must update the online vendor authorization form for the 2019...

Please note that the deadline for submitting the 2019 ICH CAHPS Survey Facility Non-Participation Form is 5:00 PM Eastern on February 28, 2019. To access this form, login to the website using your user credentials and choose “Facility Non-Participation Form” under the For Facilities menu.

As noted in an e-mail message sent to in-center hemodialysis (ICH) facilities on January 3, 2019 and posted under the Quick Links menu on the ICH CAHPS Website’s home page, all in-center hemodialysis (ICH) facilities must determine whether they will be required to administer the ICH CAHPS Survey in calendar year (CY) 2019 by counting the number of survey-eligible patients they served in CY2018.

ICH facilities that determine that they are not required to administer the 2019 ICH CAHPS Survey and those that choose not to administer the survey must complete and submit the 2019 ICH CAHPS Facility Non-Participation Form to the ICH CAHPS Coordination Team.

ICH facilities should note that the Facility Non-Participation...

The training materials that will be used during the Introduction to the In-Center Hemodialysis CAHPS (ICH CAHPS) Survey Webinar Training Session that will be held from 11:00 to 4:00 PM Eastern Time (ET) on February 13, 2019, and during the ICH CAHPS Survey Vendor Update Webinar Training Session that will be held from 1:30 to 4:00 PM Eastern Time (ET) on February 14, 2019, are available on the ICH CAHPS website at the following link.

Training Materials for the 2019 ICH CAHPS Webinar Training Sessions

Please note that all CMS-approved ICH CAHPS Survey vendors and any subcontractors that will have a significant role on the ICH CAHPS Survey must register for and attend the Vendor Update training session.

An e-mail message containing instructions for connecting to the training sessions via webinar and telephone will be sent to all registered organizations within the next few days. Please contact the ICH CAHPS...

The following ICH CAHPS Survey materials have been updated for the 2019 Spring Survey and have also been posted on the ICH CAHPS website:

Materials posted to the “Survey Materials” page here:

ICH CAHPS Cover Letters 1 and 2 in all approved languages (10 letters): Updated text referring to response option 1 in Q1 as “At home or at a skilled nursing home where I live”, instead of the previous text of “At home”, per the changes made in September 2018 to the mail surveys and the telephone scripts. English and Spanish ICH CAHPS Frequently Asked Questions Document: Created an online standalone version of these two documents for easier reference. English Telephone Script: Very minor formatting edits that do not affect implementation of previously programmed English telephone scripts. Materials posted under the “For Vendors” dropdown:

Minimum Business Requirements:...

The In-center Hemodialysis CAHPS (ICH CAHPS) Survey Administration and Specifications Manual, Version 7.0 is now available on the ICH CAHPS website in MS Word and PDF formats. The protocols and guidelines described in Version 7.0 of this manual are effective immediately and supersede those described in previous versions of the manual. To conserve paper, the ICH CAHPS Survey Coordination Team will print a limited number of hardcopy versions of this manual. Organizations may request a hardcopy manual by sending an e-mail message to the ICH CAHPS Coordination Team at ichcahps@rti.org.

Updated ICH CAHPS Survey protocols and procedures will be reviewed during the Introduction to the ICH CAHPS Survey Webinar training session on Wednesday, February 13, 2019 and during the Vendor Update Webinar Training session that will take place on Thursday, February 14, 2019. A training agenda and the presentation slides for those training sessions will be posted on the ICH CAHPS website...

This is a reminder that ICH CAHPS Survey vendors must submit all facility-specific supplemental questions that they plan to add to the 2019 ICH CAHPS Spring Survey to the Coordination Team for review and approval. If any of your in-center hemodialysis (ICH) facility clients are planning to add any new facility-specific supplemental questions to the 2019 ICH CAHPS Spring Survey, please send those questions and their proposed placement to the Coordination Team via e-mail at ichcahps@rti.org before 5:00 PM Eastern Time (ET) on February 8, 2019.

Please note that facility-specific questions that were approved by the Coordination Team for use in previous survey periods do not need to be approved again unless the questionnaire wording or response options have changed.

The Coordination Team will accept facility-specific supplemental questions for review after the February 8, 2019 deadline; however, approval of those questions may not be granted in time for the questions...

As the ICH CAHPS Coordination Team (CT) prepares for the 2019 Spring Survey sampling process, we would like to remind ICH facilities about the importance of registering and authorizing all CCNs associated with their facility on the ICH CAHPS website. Many ICH facilities have both a primary and alternate CCN associated with their facility and CROWNWeb, the CMS database that provides sampling information to the CT, may include sample patients under both CCNs.

Please carefully review the following information on this important issue.

Definition of a Primary CCN and an Alternate CCN:

A CMS Certification Number (CCN) is a number assigned to a facility for billing and administrative purposes. The CCN is sometimes referred to as the “billing number,” “provider number,” or “Medicare provider ID number.”

Regarding the ICH CAHPS Survey, the CCN is a 6-digit number assigned to each Medicare-certified ICH facility for the purpose of billing CMS for providing outpatient hemodialysis care. Each facility...