Utilizing AQUA Registry Measures Within Your Practice

Policy

CMS COVID-19 Flexibilities

Due to the current Coronavirus (COVID-19) public health emergency, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has announced flexibilities for clinicians participating in the Quality Payment Program (QPP) Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) in 2020.

Clinicians significantly impacted by COVID-19 may submit an Extreme & Uncontrollable Circumstances Application to reweight any, or all, of the MIPS performance categories to 0%. In order to do so, clinicians will need to log into the QPP website, using their HCQIS Access Roles and Profile (HARP) credentials. From there, access the ‘Exceptions Application’ and select ‘Extreme and Uncontrollable Circumstances.’

Additionally, those requesting relief via the application will need to justify how the public health emergency has significantly impacted their practice. CMS will notify clinicians of their application status by email. The Extreme and Uncontrollable Circumstances Application for 2020 is currently open and will close on December 31, 2020. For more information, contact the Quality Payment Program at 1-866-288-8292 or by email at QPP@cms.hhs.gov.

Visit Coronavirus Disease 2019 AUA Information Center to stay current on AUA events and other information relevant to AUA’s members.

2020 MIPS - Telehealth Guidance for Electronic Clinical Quality Measures (eCQMs)

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has issued guidance, for eligible clinicians, on the allowance of telehealth encounters for the Electronic Clinical Quality Measures (eCQMs) for the 2020 MIPS performance period.

Based on the services payable under the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule, many of the eCQMs include Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) and Healthcare Common Procedure Coding System (HCPCS) encounter codes that can be used for in-person or telehealth encounters. Encounters identified with CMS telehealth-eligible codes are eligible for inclusion with eCQMs, whether the encounter was provided in-person or through telehealth, unless otherwise stated in the guidance or definition statements in the header of the eCQM HTML document.

AUA has identified five recommended eCQMs often used by urologists that are eligible for telehealth encounters; they are listed below:

CMS notes there may be cases where the quality action cannot be completed during a telehealth encounter. It is the eligible clinician’s responsibility to ensure all other actions within the measure specification can be met, including quality actions that cannot be completed through telehealth.

For additional information on MIPS reporting, visit the CMS QPP website or review the Telehealth Guidance Report for eCQMs.

Questions about the eCQMs and telehealth codes should be directed to the Quality Payment Program Service Center at QPP@cms.hhs.gov or 866-288-8292.

Registry Insights

Knowledge Gained and Shared Experiences from the AQUA Registry

There are many advantages to participating in a specialty registry. In addition to MIPS reporting, knowledge generation and shared experiences are excellent examples of how the data captured help advance the profession.

Real-World Data from the AQUA Registry, cross-referenced with provider details from the AUA Annual Census, were analyzed in a study surrounding the degree of practice variation for the treatment of urethral stricture disease (USD). Review the abstract for a new study to be published in Urology: Significant Management Variability of Urethral Stricture Disease in United States: Data from the AUA Quality (AQUA) Registry by Dr. Andrew Cohen et al. As AUA’s data repository becomes more robust, additional findings to advance urology are expected to be published.

Additionally, in a recent AUA Inside Tract podcast episode, Dr. Ronald Suh, with Urology of Indiana, shared his practice’s experiences with the AQUA Registry discussing topics such as access to urology-specific measures, quality improvement opportunities, collaborations with the ABU, interactions with the AQUA Registry team, and more.

We would love to hear how you utilize AQUA Registry data to enhance your practice. To share your story, email AQUA@auanet.org.

Dashboard Updates Add Efficiencies

A new version of the “My Account” feature on your AQUA Registry dashboard was launched October 16, 2020, and looks similar to the below image:

This updated feature will serve as a centralized account management system. Users with administrative rights can access this feature to manage their end-to-end participation requirements, such as editing your organization’s demographic, contact, and TIN information. You will also be able to view, edit, add and delete clinicians, locations and users by selecting the appropriate icon. You may recall, previously, users were required to open a Service Desk ticket to make these types of changes.

Additionally, if your organization is a multi-specialty practice, there may be providers outside of urology participating in various other FIGmd-operated registries—based on their specialty. In which case, the “My Account” feature allows administrative users to centrally manage all of your organization’s medical specialties across multiple registries— making practice management simpler than ever.

We hope you will enjoy this latest feature. Please contact the Client Account Management (CAM) team at AUACams@FIGmd.com with any questions.

Customer Services Survey

2020 Summer Survey Results

Twice a year, the AQUA Registry disseminates an experience survey to its participants. The latest survey was deployed on June 24th and was sent to a total of 147 active practices. The response rate for the June survey was roughly 26%, which was slightly lower than prior surveys. We attribute the decrease in the response rate to the effects of the current public health pandemic as many of our practices are working with a decreased staff load. The remainder of this article summarizes a few practice trends from the June survey.

We asked survey respondents how often they access the AQUA Registry Dashboard. Regardless of the practice’s subscription level, or the year they joined, most sites access their dashboard once a month. Next, we asked respondents to rate their level of ease in navigating through the AQUA Registry’s Dashboard. An overwhelming 75% of respondents felt the dashboard is “easy” to navigate.

We also wanted to know how our respondents’ plan to meet the 2020 Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) requirements. Of the respondents that were MIPS eligible, the majority plan to report for 2020 MIPS through the AQUA Registry. The second most popular MIPS reporting mechanism was the practice’s electronic health record (EHR) vendor. Given that the majority of respondents are planning to use the AQUA Registry to report for 2020 MIPS, it didn’t come as a surprise that they indicated wanting more training on the MIPS module—when asked about future training topics. As a result of this finding, in September, the AQUA Registry team hosted a webinar on the 2020 MIPS requirements and what the Registry offers to meet them. If you were not able to attend, a link to the recording is available.
View the Recording

We want to thank those that were able to respond to our June experience survey. The responses help the AUA enhance the Registry to fit the needs of our participants. Please keep an eye out for the next survey, which will deploy in January 2021.

Important Dates

Tips & Tricks

Proposed 2021 Medicare Fee Schedule

As announced in the AUA Policy and Advocacy Brief earlier this month, the AUA summited comments to CMS addressing the valuation of specific codes; refinements to the outpatient evaluation and management services policy; telehealth and other services involving communications-based technology services; and proposed updates to the Quality Payment Program. Learn more.