CMS’ Final Rule on “Birthing-Friendly” Hospital Designations
By Sarah Johanek, MPH
CMS finalizes “Birthing-Friendly” hospital designations, available in Fall 2023.
“Birthing-Friendly” Hospital Designations are defined as “a publicly-reported, public-facing hospital designation on the quality and safety of maternity care.”
As outlined in our blog post titled “CMS Proposes New Rules Including Hospital “Birthing-Friendly” Designation to Address Quality and Equity,” CMS proposed a rule in April 2022 that “addresses actions inpatient and long-term hospitals must take to improve maternal health in delivery settings and ties those actions to Medicaid reimbursement.” This proposed rule included health equity-focused measures in hospital quality programs, sought stakeholder input related to documenting social determinants of health in inpatient claims data, and proposed a “Birthing-Friendly” hospital designation.
On August 1st, 2022, CMS finalized the proposed rule and is establishing Birthing-Friendly hospital designations in Fall 2023 and three health equity-focused measures in hospital quality programs. CMS will award this designation to hospitals that have participated in a national or statewide quality collaborative and carried out the recommended interventions. This will be determined by hospitals responding “Yes” to both questions in the Maternal Morbidity Structural Measure.
Additionally, for hospitals paid under the Long-Term Care Hospital (LTCH)/Inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS) that successfully participate in the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting Program and are meaningful electronic health record users, the final rule will increase in operating payment rates of 4.3%. CMS expects to increase payments to hospitals paid under the Prospective Payment System (PPS), by approximately 2.4% or $71 million.
Read more about the finalized rule here.
2020 Mom is disseminating the maternal mental health Hospital Whole Mom standards with Perinatal Quality Collaboratives (PQCs) and will share progress through upcoming reports.