Pneumonia
Reducing clinical variation for pneumonia treatment can lead to significant cost reduction since the condition is one of the highest volume DRGs in the country. Verras helped a hospital reduce “open orders” for respiratory treatments — meaning patients received treatments every day until discharged — by 19 percent through the implementation of a standardized treatment protocol.
MRIs
At one hospital, some physicians ordered twice the number of MRIs as other physicians, leading to significant variation in clinical practice. Some MRIs were not urgent, and patients were discharged before results could even be read. Once a set of criteria and a consultation process were implemented, inpatient MRIs ultimately fell by 51 percent.
Sepsis
Sepsis costs more than $22,000 per patient to treat. Verras analyzed more than 500 cases of sepsis at one hospital. It found that on a per-patient, severity adjusted basis, there was significant variation in both length of stay and charges, indicating a variation in practice patterns. Verras worked with the hospital’s
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