The CHAMP Project seeks to demonstrate that utilizing appropriate skill levels, payment strategies and new technologies can deliver better care for more people at a lower cost.

Absolutely not. CHAMP's goal is to maximize and recognize the role of existing medical practitioners of all levels and provide a means for seamless integration and reimbursement of each group's contributions to care.

CHAMP partners believe that professional RN's will be key members of the healthcare teams because of their unique combination of assessment, observation and critical thinking skills. In fact CHAMP may provide a means to repatriate RN's who are unable to return to bedside nursing due to scheduling conflicts.

A common misconception about standardized care practices is that many incorrectly think of them as a ceiling rather than a floor or safety net. Standardized practices don't prevent a skilled clinician from using their superior experience and knowledge. They merely raise the overall bar of care by eliminating practices proven to be less than ideal. Few of us would feel comfortable boarding an airliner if the pilot ignored known safety procedures, eschewed computerized navigation systems or preferred to fly by the seat of his or her pants. This is no different. Care standards are there to give practitioners check lists and procedures that serve the same purpose by reducing known risks.

No. CHAMP's goal is to put physicians skills to best use, not replace them. If CHAMP is successful, physicians will be able to concentrate on the most complex patients best served by their unique skills and at the same time be less burdened by business and administrative tasks that take physicians away from the bedside.

Yes. The efficiencies of CHAMP can be realized without a change in current billing practices.

No. CHAMP does not change the scope of practice of team members. The goal is simply to consistently utilize each practitioner type at their full scope of practice.

We believe it will have the opposite effect. Documentation issues of decision-making rationale and patient communication constitute the principal liability risk for physicians. The decision-analysis systems employed by CHAMP provide a means to document in detail the intermediate decision-making and rationale associated with a case that is almost completely lacking with our current 'after the fact' medical record keeping practices. In addition, the CHAMP system provides widely available medical knowledge and associated references to which a physician is already held accountable irrespective of their individual currency with the published medical literature. Decision-analysis technology provides a means to record and preserve a more complete accounting of medical encounters than do our current practices. This technology should increase revenue, decrease liability and provide fertile ground for later review, education and diagnostic improvements.

No. Most of the documentation is provided by associated care team members in real time or generated by the computer system itself. The physician can then review a detailed assessment without the need to repeat any but the most critical elements of the assessment and concentrate their time and effort on the most important or critical details. At the end of the assessment, the computer generates a narrative record of the case that is preformatted for billing.

The lay public accesses healthcare information on the Web millions of times each day. Such numbers either mean that patients have no expectation that a physician would know everything or that they already have questions about their medical care that they feel are unanswered. Either way, physicians who utilize such systems can address these potential concerns.

EHR's are not designed to provide the detailed oversight of non-physician clinical activities, to recognize emerging clinical patterns during an ongoing assessment, direct ongoing questioning in response to clinical findings, or to recognize the need for referral of the patient to another level of practitioner that are a significant part of CHAMP's safety strategy. These functions are a unique part of the decision-analysis software not present in EHR’s.

No. The optimized decision-analysis systems that evolve as part of CHAMP will be configured to integrate and communicate with legacy systems.

The decision-analysis software recommendations come from established peer-reviewed medical literature and are completely transparent to the user. One can query and review any and all decision analysis recommendations at any time. The publications from which the software recommendations are derived are available for the clinician’s review

No. CHAMP is complementary to other reform proposals. CHAMP addresses workflow and care delivery models which will be relevant regardless of what payment or health policies are eventually adopted.