The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)
announced on July 13 significant changes to how it will be collecting COVID-19-related data hospitals report daily to the federal government.
Starting July 15, hospitals may no longer utilize the National Healthcare Safety Network reporting system to report hospital COVID data. While that system will remain for the quality reporting metrics it was developed for, its hospital COVID-19 data module will be retired. Instead, hospitals will be required to report this data through one of two methods:
- Report data to state health departments that have been certified by the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR) to report this information on hospitals’ behalf to the federal government.
- Directly report this data via the HHS TeleTracking portal. This portal was developed for special data reporting requests to inform HHS hotspot funding and Remdesivir distributions to hospitals and states.
Additionally, HHS has asked hospitals to prioritize reporting the following data fields beginning on July 15, while expecting all the remaining fields to be reported by July 22:
- Previous day's new adult admissions for confirmed COVID-19
- Previous day's new adult admissions for suspected COVID-19
- Total adults hospitalized for COVID - suspected and confirmed
- Total hospitalized for COVID - confirmed only
- Total adults in ICU with COVID - suspected and confirmed
- Total adults in ICU with COVID - confirmed
- Remdesivir doses
What does this mean for Wisconsin hospitals? WHA is currently communicating with the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (DHS) and ASPR to determine Wisconsin’s official certification status. While DHS has been collecting data hospitals submit into EMResource on a daily basis and reporting it to HHS for some time now, it is unclear whether it has been officially certified by ASPR. DHS has informed WHA and others that it is working to add the additional fields HHS has requested to EMResource so it can continue to report all information to HHS on hospitals’ behalf. WHA has been relaying the concerns from Wisconsin hospitals and health systems on the heavy data reporting burden that has only been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, and is working to expediently clarify this so that hospitals do not need to report this data separately.
For additional information, contact WHA Chief Quality Officer
Beth Dibbert, or Director of Federal and State Relations
Jon Hoelter.