Has anyone created an OPPE (Ongoing Professional Practice Evaluation) application?

[#1]

We are evaluating the utilization of Qlik to create an OPPE reporting tool. We wonder if anyone else out there has done this and what types of issues they ran into with development and deployment.

[Dalton_Ruer]

The biggest problem we had trying to implement an OPPE was sourcing data. We had lots of different "metrics" from Excel files on 1 persons computer, cocktail napkins on another persons desk, Access database on a third persons desk. None of which could be counted on to be updated at any given point of time for synchronization.

Next problem was getting everyone to agree on the "metrics". Meaning does this count in the numerator/denominator?

Last problem was the "we need that to be excluded." That forced the system to have multiple people meet before any numbers could be "counted."

Hopefully my problems were unique

[Margaret]

We have started to. Is anyone using Meditech also?

[montgomery7aust]

Hi Bill,

I think that Dalton summed up the issues most folks run into when diving into OPPE.  One more important driver you'll need is executive backing.  You'll need executives/leaders that are willing and able to wield their power to drive home the definition of metrics.  If you have this, you'll be able to get through that part of the process in a much more time-efficient manner.

Once you have the metrics down, the remainder of the work is *simpler* in that it's usually easier to connect to and pull in data than it is to get agreement on metrics

Hope this helps, and don't hesitate to reach out if you want to talk further on this - more than happy to help.

-Austin

[montgomery7aust]

We've developed on top of Meditech pretty extensively - do you have any specific questions I might be able to assist with?

Cheers,

-Austin

[#6]

Dalton,

I wish your issues were unique, but it seems more the norm than the exception.

We saw exactly the same thing when reporting HFMA metrics before Qlik and now we see similar things when doing any app that requires a consensus on metrics and source of truth.

Bill

[Margaret]

What kinds of quality indicators are you including in general surgery and hospitalist OPPE's?

[Margaret]

Here's one database issue:

The code below shows all of the surgeons associated with a surgical case where there was a laceration or puncture comorbidity. But we do not know of a way to connect this to the surgeon.

Do you?

SELECT DISTINCT TOP 1000 adds.SourceID, adds.VisitID, adds.AbstractID, adds.ComplicationComorbidity,

                         adds.Diagnosis, adds.DiagnosisName, aos.Name AS Surgeon

  FROM livendb.dbo.AbsDrgDiagnoses adds

       JOIN livendb.dbo.AbsOperations ao ON ao.SourceID = adds.SourceID

                                        AND ao.AbstractID = adds.AbstractID

       JOIN livendb.dbo.AbsOperationSurgeons aos ON aos.SourceID = ao.SourceID

                                                AND aos.AbstractID = ao.AbstractID

                                                AND aos.OperationSeqID = ao.OperationSeqID

WHERE ComplicationComorbidity IS NOT NULL

    AND (   lower (DiagnosisName) LIKE '%laceration%'

         OR lower (DiagnosisName) LIKE '%puncture%')

[Margaret]

In other words: Who was holding the scalpel that cut the patient?

[jslancas]

What metrics are you trying to monitor and/or what questions are you trying to answer?  I know that different organizations are looking to answer different questions, so it would be helpful to know what your angle is here. 

I have done some work in this area, but am not sure if my solution would be helpful to you and your situation.  We have pulled together (joined) hospital and physician practice system datasets to allow for better system-wide reporting and analysis.