Pain assessment and follow-up for patients with dementia

Measure Purpose: Identify and treat pain effectively

The numerator: patients with dementia who underwent documented screening for pain symptoms at every visit and if screening was positive also had documentation of a follow-up plan (See measure specifications for complete definitions.)

is divided by

the denominator: all patients with dementia (See measure specification for the complete list of qualifying diagnoses.)

There are no exclusions for this measure.

Key Phrases

Examples of key phrases you could use to meet this measure include:

• Pain screened
• PAINAD score
• Treatment plan updated
• Referral to physical therapy

Measure Calculation Example

Dr. Patel has 1,000 patient visits for patients with dementia between January 1 and December 31. This is the denominator. There are no exclusions for this measure.

Dr. Patel assesses for pain at 850 of these visits. Of those 850 screenings, 600 patients had a negative screening and met the measure as no follow-up plan indicated.  250 visits had a positive screening warranting follow-up. Dr. Patel documents follow-up for 175 of the 250 visits.  The numerator is 775. 600 visits where patients screened negative plus 175 visits where patients who screened positive and had appropriate follow-up documented.

Quality of patient care = 775 (600+175)/1000. Dr. Patel has a score of 77.5% for this measure.