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New QA scoring - MORE than 99%

Posted: May 26, 2011

I hope you all realize that the new scoring is not about a goal of 99% at all. It's not even based on a percentage, just an arbitrary "score". Since all reports, short or long, start with a "score" of 100 with errors deducted from there, it would be like going to school and one day having a quiz of 10 questions where you could get 1 wrong (90%) and still pass, but the next day, a test with 300 questions would count the same (100 points), where if you got 2 wrong (98 "points" which would be close to 99%), you would fail.

Needless to say, which reports they choose to audit any one of us on makes all the difference. If they want to keep us, they'll audit short reports. Want to get rid of us? Audit a long report.

I thought that was the old way, where shorter - reports made us fail

[ In Reply To ..]
I was told that this is more fair to us? Who really knows. I know that either way, if they want us gone, they will have us gone, either old way or new way.

I can correct my QA's report and find errors, that is just the way it is.

This was the first thing I learned from my old QA, she told me "I can make anyone fail an audit."

Flat scoring vs APS scoring - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
All along the company has used APS scoring where the length of the report was factored in so that you truly have a percentage of quality score.

If the new 99 quality goal is flat scoring, the length of a document will not matter.

It sounds to me you don't understand the difference between the 2 methods.

Trust me, the flat scoring is a MUCH more fair scoring system than APS (accuracy percentage scoring) could ever be!

With flat scoring, a 0.25-point error is simply that. If you used APS scoring, that 0.25-point error could be the death of your score if you had a short report.

Me

Explain to me then - MORE than 99%

[ In Reply To ..]
I'm quite willing to accept that I'm thinking of it the wrong way, but you'll have to explain. I understand the part about a tiny error failing a short report, but in this case, they can easily pick a long report and certainly find enough 0.25 errors (they only need 5) to fail it. I don't see how that is "more fair".

I think of it as I pointed out - that a 10 line report would allow 1 point off (or four 0.25 errors if you want to think of it that way) whereas a LONG 300+ line report would still only allow those same four 0.25 errors.

Again, please explain how it's more fair.

As I understand it - Anon

[ In Reply To ..]
Not the poster above, but with new system, if you had one 0.25 error in a short report of 4 words, that would give you score of 99.75. In APS, if you one 0.25 error in a report of 4 words, then you would get a score around 75, so would fail.

However, you are right in that the new system privileges the short report at the expense of the long report, because there are more opportunities to get multiple erorrs in a long report. However, there may be studies that show you will not necessary get more errors in a long report.

Flat scoring vs APS scoring - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
Here's how:

Points are divided into critical, major and minor categories. Critical errors impact patient safety. Major errors compromise the integrity of the report/document. Minor errors show areas of needed improvement.

With APS scoring, whether or not a document passes the quality review is mainly dependent on the length of the report in ratio to the length of the document. With flat scoring, only the weight of the error is considered. With either scoring method, the longer a document the more opportunities for error and it would just make a lower score, period.

However, to achieve the main goal of protecting the patient and record as well as relating the true impact of an MT's error, flat scoring is more fair to all MTs.

Here are 3 examples of how APS fails the task and how flat scoring accomplishes it --

1. MINOR ERRORS will truly be a minor impact for the patient, client and the MT: A job with only 11 lines but a single error worth half a point (0.5 point) would FAIL with APS scoring because it would score at 95%. With flat scoring, the 0.5 point would be deducted from a 100 point for a perfect document so the resulting score would be 99.5.

2. MAJOR ERRORS will reflect more seriously for the patient, client and MT: A job with 35 lines and a major error of 1.5 points would FAIL with APS scoring of 96.5% while flat scoring would pass it at a score of 98.5.

3. CRITICAL ERRORS should fail a document regardless of length which is what the goal is for the patient, client and MT: A job with 135 lines with a critical error of 3.0 points would PASS on APS scoring with a 98% but FAIL with flat scoring of 97.

The point is that APS scoring makes minor and major errors FAIL a document (and, thus, the MT) depending on the length of the document while PASSING a report with a critical error - again, depending on the length of the document. Flat scoring STOPS that discrimination.

An MT who has a critical error (or even a total of 3.0 points of other errors) should NOT pass a quality review regardless of any other factor, period. An MT who has a minor or major error of less than 3.0 points(or a total of such points) SHOULD pass the quality review regardless of any other factor.

I hope this helps.

That was AWESOME! - A huge thank you

[ In Reply To ..]
I wish the Q would have stated just that. How darn hard is it to explain to people how they are being scored? I remember being audited only on short reports before, so I am thinking that now I will be audited only on long ones, but that is ok... I will pay much closer attention to the long ones because I am expecting it now.

Thank you so much for taking some time (which is so precious) to help us out.

You've explained their position well - MORE than 99%

[ In Reply To ..]
While I can agree with the critical error part, it's not hard to see how they can take a fairly long report and be able to find enough in the way of missing commas or SOMETHING to fail someone.

And it's STILL NOT a percentage. It's an arbitrary "score".

Commas are feedback only - MT

[ In Reply To ..]
Ask your QC for the error definitions. Commas are feedback only. There are no points taken off for punctuation.

Whether a report is short or long your goal should be to get it correct. If a job is long, that does not give you the okay to make errors.

There is a patient behind that long report, just as there is behind the short report.

Scare tactics - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
There is also an MT behind that report whose survival is directly tied to the decisions being made by those who run companies like this one. Yes, the goal should be to get it correct, but not if it means having to go hungry to do so. When companies pay their employees pitifully low wages, they have no basis for demanding perfection. This notion that MTs making minimum wage are responsibile for patient harm is tiresome. You want an accurate report, pay the MTs what they're worth. It's that simple. Don't incentivize quantity over quality by cutting pay, penalizing blanks, and forcing MTs to rush through jobs in order to stay afloat. When the MT is forced into such a situation, the blame for inaccuracies and their consequences lies with those at the top, not the MT. To suggest otherwise is absurd.

Bravo! - Exactly

[ In Reply To ..]
I too am sick and tired of hearing that corporate line about being responsible for patient care. Like we have MORE responsibility than the doctor dictating the report at breakneck speed while driving, or eating, or sitting somewhere with a loud conversation, interrupted by loud intermittent laughter in the background. But, gee, it is all up to us, the lowly transcriptionist to be SO professional and accuracy-driven.

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