AHA blasts JCAHO for bid on peer review contract
A letter from Dick Davidson, president of the American Hospital Association (AHA) in Chicago, to the president of the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations criticizes the accrediting body for what the AHA says is a seriously misguided strategy.
Davidson recently sent the letter to Joint Com-mission President Dennis O’Leary, MD, and then made the letter public. The letter expresses the AHA’s "deep disappointment in the Joint Com-mission’s continued lack of focus on its core mission — competent accreditation — and on its most important customers — hospitals. I am referring to the Joint Commission’s recent attempt to bid on a peer review organization [PRO] contract." The Joint Commission’s Executive Committee initially rejected the plan but then agreed to have Joint Commission Resources, a separate arm of the Joint Commission that provides consulting services, become a subcontractor in a PRO bid by CIMRO, an Illinois medical review group.
Davidson calls the move "one more example of the Joint Commission’s seeming inability to decide whether it is an accrediting organization or a regulatory agency — one more arm of a government bureaucracy.
If the Joint Commission is still committed to its role as an accreditor, then a series of serious problems surrounding the accreditation process, the development of standards and other issues critical to that core mission must be addressed. While JCAHO has taken some steps to address these serious concerns, those steps have been small and happened at a glacial pace. If, however, JCAHO is determined to abandon this role for that of a regulator and government contractor, then hospitals must rethink the basic parameters of the relationship." Davidson says he has repeatedly voiced the AHA’s concerns over the Joint Commission’s strategies and that the group continues to support the idea of a private, voluntary accreditation process. "Regrettably, we watch with dismay as JCAHO seems to stray from this crucial focus and squanders the trust that is so vital to a credible accreditation system. JCAHO’s challenge is clear: determine whether it wants to be the engine to help the nation’s hospitals improve quality of patient care or simply fulfill a compliance and regulatory function for the federal government."
The Joint Commission did not issue any public response to Davidson’s letter.
[For more information, contact:
• Dick Davidson, President, American Hospital Association, One North Franklin, Chicago, IL 60606-3421. Telephone: (312) 422-3000.]
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