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Cardiovascular Project 2010-2013

Call for Intent
April 2024

CALL FOR INTENT TO SUBMIT NEW STANDARDS
Cardiovascular Project 2010-2013

NQF is initiating a consensus development project seeking endorsement of measures for Cardiovascular Project 2010-2013

NOTICE TO MEASURE STEWARDS

If, after reviewing this Call for Intent, your organization believes it has one or more measures that address the scope and objectives of this project as described below and would like NQF to evaluate them for possible endorsement, please submit a call for intent to submit candidate standards by 28 September, 2010 to complete this process.

NQF has recently converted to electronic submission of materials. To submit your intent, log in with your NQF username and password and complete the form for each intended measure submission. If you have not created an NQF account, please follow the instructions on the log-in page.

BACKGROUND

The human and financial costs of cardiovascular disease are significant. Heart disease is the leading cause of death for men and women in the United States and it is estimated to have cost the United States $316.4 billion in 2010. Hypertension affects one in three Americans and increases their risk for heart disease, stroke, or kidney disease. It is estimated to cost $76.6 billion in healthcare services, medications, and missed days of work. NQF has endorsed a large number of consensus standards to evaluate the quality of care for cardiovascular conditions in the ambulatory and in-patient settings over the past nine years. An evaluation of all NQF-endorsed cardiovascular measures and consideration of new measures will ensure the currency of NQF’s portfolio of voluntary consensus standards.

As the quality measurement enterprise has matured, better data from clinical registries and electronic health records can support the demand for meaningful performance measures. There has also been a shift to focus on outcomes and composite measures.

Note: 1 Lloyd-Jones D, Adams RJ, Brown TM, et al. Heart disease and stroke statistics—2010 update:a report from the American Heart Association . Circulation. 2010;121(7):e46-e215.

SCOPE OF ACTIVITIES

This Consensus Standards Endorsement Maintenance project consists of two activities:

1. Evaluation of new submissions of measures for cardiovascular conditions including: hypertension, coronary artery disease, acute myocardial infarction (AMI), percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), heart failure, atrial fibrillation, or any other heart disease and any treatments, diagnostic studies, interventions, or procedures associated with these conditions.
Submitted measures may be:
a. structure, process, outcome or composite
measures;
b. applicable to any care setting and ideally
applicable to multiple care settings; and
c. applicable to any age, including children
as appropriate.

2. Maintenance of endorsement for NQF-endorsed voluntary cardiovascular consensus standards that were endorsed prior to June 2008.

Due to the number of measures, the project will be conducted in two phases:

Phase 1 – coronary artery disease, AMI, and PCI, including treatments, diagnostic studies, interventions, or procedures associated with these conditions.

The Call for Measures for Phase 1 will begin on September 29, 2010.

The online submission forms for measures undergoing maintenance and new measure submissions will be available September 15, 2010.

Phase 2 – hypertension, heart failure, atrial fibrillation, and other heart disease and treatments, diagnostic studies, interventions, or procedures associated with these conditions.

The online submission forms for measures undergoing maintenance and new measure submissions will be available September 15, 2010.

Both newly submitted measures and consensus standards for maintenance review will undergo the nine-step Consensus Development Process (CDP), including review against the most recent NQF evaluation criteria. In addition to ensuring currency of specifications and evidence for the focus of the measure, endorsement maintenance provides the opportunity to harmonize specifications, to ensure that an endorsed measure represents the “best in class,” and to seek input from those who have implemented existing NQF-endorsed® measures undergoing maintenance review.

Measure developers are asked to specify how “e-ready” their measures are, and to the extent possible, NQF will work with measure developers to submit measures that include electronic specification for electronic health records (EHR) that would align with the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act’s Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (ARRA- HITECH) requirements.

THE NQF PROCESS

The candidate measures will be considered for NQF endorsement as voluntary consensus standards. Agreement around the recommendations will be developed through NQF’s formal CDP. This project will involve the active participation of representatives from across the spectrum of healthcare stakeholders and will be guided by a multi-stakeholder Cardiovascular Steering Committee.

Any organization or individual may submit measures for consideration. To be evaluated, candidate consensus standards must be within the scope of the project and meet the following general conditions as specified in the measure evaluation criteria:

A. The measure is in the public domain or an intellectual property agreement is signed.

B. The measure owner/steward verifies there is an identified responsible entity and process to maintain and update the measure on a schedule that is commensurate with the rate of clinical innovation, but at least every three years.

C. The intended use of the measure includes both public reporting and quality improvement.

D. The requested measure submission information is complete. Generally, measures should be fully developed and tested* so that all the evaluation criteria have been addressed and information needed to evaluate the measure is provided.

*Measures without testing results as outlined in the Scientific Acceptability of Measure Properties) may be eligible for time-limited endorsement if all of the following conditions are met:
• An incumbent measure does not address the specific topic of interest in the proposed measure;
• A critical timeline must be met (e.g., legislative mandate);
• The measure is not complex (e.g., composite, requires risk adjustment); and
• The measure steward must verify a timeline and committed resources to conduct testing within 12 months if granted time-limited endorsement.

Measure stewards also must have a fully executed Measure Steward Agreement with NQF. Information on submitting measures to NQF can be found on the NQF website at http://www.qualityforum.org/Measuring_Performance/Consensus_Development_Process’s_Principle/Call_for_Candidate_Standards.aspx.

FUNDING

This project is supported under a contract provided by the Department of Health and Human Services.

CONTACT INFORMATION

For more information, contact Kathryn Goodwin at (202) 783-1300 or via e-mail at kgoodwin@qualityforum.org.

Calendar Help

Cardiovascular Project 2010-2013

CALL FOR INTENT TO SUBMIT NEW STANDARDS Cardiovascular Project 2010-2013

CALL FOR INTENT TO SUBMIT NEW STANDARDS
Cardiovascular Project 2010-2013