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§ 1300.70. Health Care Service Plan Quality Assurance Program.

28 CA ADC § 1300.70Barclays Official California Code of Regulations

Barclays California Code of Regulations

Title 28. Managed Health Care

Division 1. The Department of Managed Health Care

Chapter 2. Health Care Service Plans (Refs & Annos)

Article 8. Self-Policing Procedures

28 CCR § 1300.70

§ 1300.70. Health Care Service Plan Quality Assurance Program.

Currentness

(a) Intent and Regulatory Purpose.

(1) The QA program must be directed by providers and must document that the quality of care provided is being reviewed, that problems are being identified, that effective action is taken to improve care where deficiencies are identified, and that follow-up is planned where indicated.

(2) This section is not intended to set forth a prescriptive approach to QA methodology. This section is intended to afford each plan flexibility in meeting Act quality of care requirements.

(3) A plan's QA program must address service elements, including accessibility, availability, and continuity of care. A plan's QA program must also monitor whether the provision and utilization of services meets professionally recognized standards of practice.

(4) The Department's assessment of a plan's QA program will focus on:

(A) the scope of QA activities within the organization;

(B) the structure of the program itself and its relationship to the plan's administrative structure;

(D) the level of activity of the program and its effectiveness in identifying and correcting deficiencies in care.

(b) Quality Assurance Program Structure and Requirements.

(1) Program Structure.

To meet the requirements of the Act which require plans to continuously review the quality of care provided, each plan's quality assurance program shall be designed to ensure that:

(A) a level of care which meets professionally recognized standards of practice is being delivered to all enrollees;

(B) quality of care problems are identified and corrected for all provider entities;

(C) physicians (or in the case of specialized plans, dentists, optometrists, psychologists or other appropriate licensed professionals) who provide care to the plan's enrollees are an integral part of the QA program;

(D) appropriate care which is consistent with professionally recognized standards of practice is not withheld or delayed for any reason, including a potential financial gain and/or incentive to the plan providers, and/or others; and

(E) the plan does not exert economic pressure to cause institutions to grant privileges to health care providers that would not otherwise be granted, nor to pressure health care providers or institutions to render care beyond the scope of their training or experience.

(2) Program Requirements.

In order to meet these obligations each plan's QA program shall meet all of the following requirements:

(A) There must be a written QA plan describing the goals and objectives of the program and organization arrangements, including staffing, the methodology for on-going monitoring and evaluation of health services, the scope of the program, and required levels of activity.

(B) Written documents shall delineate QA authority, function and responsibility, and provide evidence that the plan has established quality assurance activities and that the plan's governing body has approved the QA Program. To the extent that a plan's QA responsibilities are delegated within the plan or to a contracting provider, the plan documents shall provide evidence of an oversight mechanism for ensuring that delegated QA functions are adequately performed.

(C) The plan's governing body, its QA committee, if any, and any internal or contracting providers to whom QA responsibilities have been delegated, shall each meet on a quarterly basis, or more frequently if problems have been identified, to oversee their respective QA program responsibilities. Any delegated entity must maintain records of its QA activities and actions, and report to the plan on an appropriate basis and to the plan's governing body on a regularly scheduled basis, at least quarterly, which reports shall include findings and actions taken as a result of the QA program. The plan is responsible for establishing a program to monitor and evaluate the care provided by each contracting provider group to ensure that the care provided meets professionally recognized standards of practice. Reports to the plan's governing body shall be sufficiently detailed to include findings and actions taken as a result of the QA program and to identify those internal or contracting provider components which the QA program has identified as presenting significant or chronic quality of care issues.

(D) Implementation of the QA program shall be supervised by a designated physician(s), or in the case of specialized plans, a designated dentist(s), optometrist(s), psychologist(s) or other licensed professional provider, as appropriate.

(E) Physician, dentist, optometrist, psychologist or other appropriate licensed professional participation in QA activity must be adequate to monitor the full scope of clinical services rendered, resolve problems and ensure that corrective action is taken when indicated. An appropriate range of specialist providers shall also be involved.

(F) There must be administrative and clinical staff support with sufficient knowledge and experience to assist in carrying out their assigned QA activities for the plan and delegated entities.

(G) Medical groups or other provider entities may have active quality assurance programs which the plan may use. In all instances, however, the plan must retain responsibility for reviewing the overall quality of care delivered to plan enrollees.

If QA activities are delegated to a participating provider to ensure that each provider has the capability to perform effective quality assurance activities, the plan must do the following:

(1) Inform each provider of the plan's QA program, of the scope of that provider's QA responsibilities, and how it will be monitored by the plan.

(2) Ascertain that each provider to which QA responsibilities have been delegated has an in-place mechanism to fulfill its responsibilities, including administrative capacity, technical expertise and budgetary resources.

(3) Have ongoing oversight procedures in place to ensure that providers are fulfilling all delegated QA responsibilities.

(4) Require that standards for evaluating that enrollees receive health care consistent with professionally recognized standards of practice are included in the provider's QA program, and be assured of the entity's continued adherence to these standards.

(5) Ensure that for each provider the quality assurance/utilization review mechanism will encompass provider referral and specialist care patterns of practice, including an assessment of timely access to specialists, ancillary support services, and appropriate preventive health services based on reasonable standards established by the plan and/or delegated providers.

(6) Ensure that health services include appropriate preventive health care measures consistent with professionally recognized standards of practice. There should be screening for conditions when professionally recognized standards of practice indicate that screening should be done.

(H) A plan that has capitation or risk-sharing contracts must:

1. Ensure that each contracting provider has the administrative and financial capacity to meet its contractual obligations; the plan shall have systems in place to monitor QA functions.

2. Have a mechanism to detect and correct under-service by an at-risk provider (as determined by its patient mix), including possible under utilization of specialist services and preventive health care services.

(I) Inpatient Care.

1. A plan must have a mechanism to oversee the quality of care provided in an inpatient setting to its enrollees which monitors that:

a. providers utilize equipment and facilities appropriate to the care; and

b. if hospital services are fully capitated that appropriate referral procedures are in place and utilized for services not customarily provided at that hospital.

2. The plan may delegate inpatient QA functions to hospitals, and may rely on the hospital's existing QA system to perform QA functions. If a plan does delegate QA responsibilities to a hospital, the plan must ascertain that the hospital's quality assurance procedure will specifically review hospital services provided to the plan's enrollees, and will review services provided by plan physicians within the hospital in the same manner as other physician services are reviewed.

(c) In addition to the internal quality of care review system, a plan shall design and implement reasonable procedures for continuously reviewing the performance of health care personnel, and the utilization of services and facilities, and cost. The reasonableness of the procedures and the adequacy of the implementation thereof shall be demonstrated to the to the Department.

Credits

Note: Authority cited: Sections 1344 and 1370, Health and Safety Code. Reference: Section 1370, Health and Safety Code.