Personal Outcome Interviews
Posted by: CQL on 12/29/2006
Filed under: Wisconsin
Wisconsin Department of Health and Family Services Family Care
The Situation
Beginning in 1997, the Department of Health and Family Services began looking at advanced and innovative methods for measuring quality – going beyond traditional process measures. The goal was to match the innovation in the redesigned system of long term care in Wisconsin – known as Family Care – with a new vision for quality.
The Designing Quality Work Group set forth three core principles for a consumer-centered approach to quality:
- Based on outcomes and quality of life rather than attributes of the services
- Objective assessment of whether these outcomes were present for each individual
- Provide for system improvement
CQL became a partner to the program in the development of the Family Care outcomes and in the data collection process.
What CQL Did
CQL staff were engaged with Department of Health and Family Services over a number of years to:
- Develop, field test and revise a modified interview tool based on the department’s needs and the target populations
- Provide training, monitoring and reliability assessment for statewide staff in the interview and assessment process
- Select stratified sample of program participants, conduct interviews, enter and analyze data, and write reports
- Provide consulting services to the Department for the assessment of the outcomes of services provided to recipients of Family Care across the state
- Provide ongoing technical assistance
Each year, we conducted interviews using the Personal Outcome Measures SM with hundreds of people participating in the Medicaid Waiver program. Because Wisconsin operates a consolidated waiver program, interviews were conducted with four different populations:
- people with developmental disabilities
- people with mental illness
- people who are elderly
- children in the Family Care program