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(b) Fiscal surveys of hospitals conducted by the department.
(2) Contents. The uncompensated health care services report shall contain all of the following information:
(a) For each hospital, the report shall list all of the following:
1. The city in which the hospital is located.
2. The type of the hospital.
3. The dollar amount of charity care provided for the most recent fiscal year.
4. The proportion of total annual gross patient revenue that constitutes the charity care.
5. The annual amount of bad debt.
6. The proportion of total annual gross patient revenue that constitutes the bad debt.
7. The total annual dollar amount of charity care and bad debt.
8. The proportion of total annual gross patient revenue that constitutes both charity care and bad debt.
9. The proportion of total nongovernmental patient revenue that constitutes the charity care.
10. The proportion of total nongovernmental patient revenue that constitutes the bad debt.
11. The proportion of total annual nongovernmental patient revenue that constitutes both charity care and bad debt.
12. The number of patients that received charity care during the most recent fiscal year.
13. The number of patients projected to receive charity care during the subsequent fiscal year.
14. The number of bad debt patient accounts during the most recent fiscal year.
15. The number of bad debt patient accounts projected for the subsequent fiscal year.
16. The total number of charity care and bad debt cases during the most recent fiscal year.
17. The total number of charity care and bad debt cases projected for the subsequent fiscal year.
18. Whether and to what extent the hospital has outstanding obligations on state loan funds, excluding fund proceeds from the Wisconsin health and educational facilities authority, during the most recent fiscal year.
(b) For each hospital with county general relief revenues greater than $500,000 or 1% of total gross patient revenue for the most recent fiscal year, the report shall list all of the following:
1. The county in which the hospital is located.
2. The amount of general relief revenues the hospital received.
3. The proportion of total gross revenue that the general relief revenue represents.
4. The proportion of charges for general relief cases that were reimbursed by counties.
(c) A copy of the department’s hospital uncompensated health care plan survey.
(d) A copy of the department’s hospital fiscal survey.
(e) A glossary of terms used in the report.
(f) Brief discussions of all of the following:
1. The definition of uncompensated health care services.
2. Problems associated with measuring hospitals’ charitable contributions to their communities.
3. Summary statistics pertaining to uncompensated health care services.
4. How hospitals project uncompensated health care.
5. How hospitals verify the need for charity care.
6. A list of hospitals with obligations to provide reasonable amounts of charity care.
7. How hospitals notify the public about charity care.
(3) Report dissemination. The department shall distribute a paper copy of the report at no charge to the governor, the legislature and a board-approved list of individuals and agencies. The department shall make the paper version of the report available for purchase by others. The department shall make available from the department’s website an electronic version of the report at no charge.
(4) Suggested uses of report. Some suggestions for using the report are as follows:
(a) By legislators and policymakers to determine the level of uncompensated health care provided in various areas of the state and, in turn, whether the burden of uncompensated health care is fairly shared by all hospitals.
(b) In conjunction with other available information, by insurance companies and other third-party payers and by business or consumer groups to determine the extent to which uncompensated health care affects hospitals’ charges and hospitals’ ability to provide services to a community.
(c) As a resource document for persons wishing to conduct research or seek information on uncompensated health care.
History: Cr. Register, December, 2000, No. 540, eff. 1-1-01.
DHS 120.26 Hospital quality indicators report.
(1) Data source. The hospital quality indicators report shall be based on hospital inpatient data collected by the department under s. DHS 120.12 (5). The inpatient discharge data are reformatted by the department to be consistent with nationally recognized quality indicators.
Note: An example of nationally recognized quality indicators are the health care utilization project (HCUP) quality indicators.
(2) Contents. The hospital quality indicators report shall present variations in the delivery of inpatient care at individual hospitals without identifying the individual hospitals. The purpose of the report is to promote improvements in the overall quality of hospital care by providing an analysis of the variations in care delivery across the state. Where appropriate, national comparisons serve as improvement benchmarks. Each report shall include all the following information:
(a) A description of the report’s data and the limitations in interpreting the data.
(b) A description of nationally recognized quality indicators.
(c) A discussion of how to interpret the analysis of the variations in care delivery across the state.
(d) A graphical presentation of the performance of hospitals relative to the quality indicators selected for presentation in the report.
(e) A discussion of how a hospital may obtain from the department hospital-specific information resulting from application of the nationally recognized quality indicators.
(3) Report dissemination.
(a) The department shall distribute a paper copy of the report at no charge to the governor, the legislature and a board-approved list of individuals and agencies. The department shall make the paper version of the report available for purchase by others. The department shall make available from the department’s website an electronic version of the report at no charge.
(b) The department may not release the identity of the individual hospitals in the report. Individual hospitals may request information from the department that allows the hospital to assess the hospital’s standing relative to a group of hospitals with comparable patient volumes or state or national benchmarks.
(4) Suggested uses of report. Some suggestions for using the report are as follows:
(a) By legislators and policymakers to examine the variation in indicators of hospital quality for various diagnoses and procedures and, in turn, whether the variation suggests the need for improvements in the quality of the health care delivery system.
(b) In conjunction with other available information, by commercial and public health care purchasers to determine the extent of variation in indicators of hospital quality. Contracts between health care purchasers and health plans and providers may address concerns arising from the reported indicators of quality.
(c) As a resource document for persons wishing to conduct research or seek information on hospital quality indicators.
(d) As a resource for consumers interested in learning about the expected outcomes of hospital care associated with a specific diagnostic category or a procedure.
(e) As a resource for individual hospitals that want to assess the need for quality improvement projects.
History: Cr. Register, December, 2000, No. 540, eff. 1-1-01.
Subchapter V — Data Dissemination
DHS 120.29 Public use files.
(1) Public use data files based on information submitted by health care providers other than hospitals or ambulatory surgery centers may not permit the identification of specific patients, employers or health care providers. The department shall protect identification of patients, employers and health care providers by all necessary means, including all of the following:
(a) The deletion of patient identifiers.
(b) The use of calculated variables and aggregated variables.
(c) The specification of counties as to residence rather than zip codes.
(d) The use of 5-year categories for age rather than exact age.
(e) Not releasing information concerning a patient’s race or ethnicity, or dates of admission, discharge, procedures or visits.
(f) Masking sensitive diagnoses and procedures by use of larger diagnostic and procedure categories.
(2) Public use data files under s. 153.45 (1) (b) 2., Stats., may include only the following:
(a) The patient’s county of residence.
(b) The payment source, by type.
(c) The patient’s age category, by 5-year intervals.
(d) The patient’s procedure code.
(e) The patient’s diagnostic code.
(f) Charges assessed with respect to the procedure code.
(g) The name and address of the facility in which the patient’s services were rendered.
(h) The patient’s gender.
(i) Information that contains the name of the health care provider who is an individual, if the independent review board first reviews and approves the release or if the department promulgates rules that specify the circumstances under which the independent review board need not review and approve the release.
(j) Calendar quarters of service during which the patient visit or procedure occurred, except if the department determines the number of data records included in the public use file is too small to enable protection of patient confidentiality.
(k) Information, other than patient-identifiable data, as defined in s. 153.50 (1) (b), Stats., as approved by the independent review board.
(3) 
(a) Public use data files based on information submitted by hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers may not permit the identification of specific patients or employers.
(b) The department shall protect the identification of patients and employers by all necessary means, including all of the following:
1. The deletion of patient identifiers.
2. The use of calculated variables and aggregated variables.
3. Not releasing information concerning a patient’s race or ethnicity, or dates of admission, discharge, procedures or visits.
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Published under s. 35.93, Stats. Updated on the first day of each month. Entire code is always current. The Register date on each page is the date the chapter was last published.