AAOS, Joint Commission Collaborate on Care Standardization

Hip and knee patients should certainly benefit from a new agreement between two powerhouse entities.

The American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS) has announced a new collaboration with The Joint Commission to incorporate the wealth of AAOS clinical expertise “into standards development and performance measurement requirements for Total Hip and Knee Replacement (THKR) Certification. “

“… the organizations will jointly oversee scientific issues, performance measurement, quality improvement activities, education, data sharing and research related to the certification.” According to AAOS, this includes, as of January 1, 2019, “… implementation of a new THKR certification requirement for hospitals and ASCs to participate in a national registry, like the American Joint Replacement Registry (AJRR), to further help standardize care and quality improvement in hip and knee replacements.”

AAOS President David A. Halsey, M.D. told OTW, “This past summer, our CEO Tom Arend received a call from the Joint Commission regarding the potential for collaboration. It turned out that their ideas fit nicely into our strategic objective to grow the awareness and impact of the American Joint Replacement Registry (AJRR).”

“At this point we have over 1,100 participating hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs) submitting data to what is the world’s largest hip and knee arthroplasty registry by annual procedural volume captured. This certification will make that number grow in leaps and bounds.”

“This collaboration leverages patient participation in the value-based reimbursement model and eases the burden for surgeons. When you participate in a program like the Joint Commission accreditation it energizes doctors and hospitals to examine their processes so as to ensure they are obtaining the best evidence and using standardized protocols for data collection and reporting. This will lead to consistent, high-quality data as patients will be submitting their data in a deidentified form and doctors learn real-time about their own professional performance.”

“As of January 1, 2019, hospitals can begin applying for the additional accreditation. Part of the criteria for applying and receiving The Joint Commission’s additional advanced certification will be the active and ongoing participation in a national hip and knee registry. This is not exclusive to AJRR, but we already have our experts on their panels and can develop standard performance measures for hospitals.”

“The Joint Commission is getting more traction with this accreditation. It is more work for the hospitals, but the top tier hospitals have been doing most of this work already. Since the majority of procedures are NOT done in major hospitals that may already be doing this work—and an increasing number of procedures are performed in ambulatory settings—this advanced certification offers an opportunity for more facilities to raise the bar of quality now and in the future.”

“We are thrilled to be working with The Joint Commission. Together, through this joint collaboration, we have the opportunity to improve orthopaedics for the better.”

“Organizations that achieve The Joint Commission’s already rigorous Total Hip and Total Knee Replacement Certification will gain an even stronger foundation for ensuring highly reliable high-quality care and outcomes for their patients through the Academy’s collaboration with our program,” says David Baker, M.D., executive vice president, Division of Healthcare Quality Evaluation, The Joint Commission.