CMS Staff Tracking System Promises More Accuracy

The new payroll-based journal (PBJ) system developed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to determine the staffing component ratings in the Five-Star Quality Rating System will likely be “a huge change, [resulting in] a more comprehensive and more accurate” look at a facility’s staffing, Ashkan Javaheri, MD, CMD, said at the AMDA – the Society for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Annual Conference.

Medical directors’ hours are part and parcel of the new system, and “it’s important to understand that the hours you [record and] submit should be based on your medical directorship duties — on what the facility is paying you to do,” said Dr. Javaheri, assistant professor at the University of California–Davis School of Medicine and head of the geriatric division at Mercy Medical Group–Dignity Health Medical Foundation in Sacramento. “Hours for your patient care are not reportable in PBJ.”