Regulatory Requirements | 01.26.22
NAMSS Releases its 2021 Roundtable Report on Practitioner Reappointment and Continuous Monitoring
By Molly Giammarco, MPP
NAMSS is pleased to release its 2021 Roundtable Report, which provides an overview of its seventh-annual Roundtable, Focused Revision: Moving to a Three-Year Practitioner Reappointment Cycle and Enhancing Continuous Monitoring. On September 9, 2021, NAMSS returned to hosting its annual Roundtable series after a COVID-induced hiatus in 2020. Held virtually for the first time, NAMSS convened stakeholders in healthcare credentialing to discuss inefficiencies and overlaps that result from a two-year practitioner reappointment cycle and continuous monitoring.
Ahead of the 2021 Roundtable, NAMSS issued a position statement supporting systematic revisions to extend the practitioner reappointment cycle and enhance continuous monitoring processes. The statement outlines the current overlap between practitioner reappointment processes and Ongoing Professional Practice Evaluation (OPPE), which places additional burden on medical staff offices.
The 2021 Roundtable discussion centered on the rationale for a 24-month reappointment cycle when OPPE takes place continuously. Because no rigid protocol exists for OPPE, there is a general hesitation to reduce the frequency of reappointment. Many Roundtable attendees noted this and encouraged the development of resources and best practices to inform effective and realistic standards for continuous monitoring. NAMSS recognizes this need and its leadership role developing and implementing these standards.
As the leader in healthcare credentialing, NAMSS and its members, play a critical role in identifying best practices for credentialing excellence and setting the stage for their widespread adoption. By establishing credentialing best practices through the Ideal Credentialing Standards, NAMSS has positioned itself as the leader in the effort to equip MSPs with the knowledge, confidence, and willingness to implement meaningful change to a much-needed credentialing process.
With resources, education, and eventually standards, comprehensive and effective OPPE could help move the industry toward a longer reappointment cycle, as well as embrace other initiatives that could help make practitioner credentialing and competency processes more efficient and effective.
Look for more from NAMSS on this initiative, as well as others, which enable Tomorrow’s MSP and continue to demonstrate MSPs as the thought leaders and experts around improved credentialing and competency processes. Actions from NAMSS, and by extension, MSPs, will enable both healthcare systems and their personnel to embrace, and adapt to, the quickly evolving healthcare landscape.
A special thank you to NAMSS Government Relations Liaison, Diane Meldi, for her visionary leadership and expertise in improving healthcare credentialing processes for Tomorrow’s MSP.