Ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs) can use benchmarking as a strategic tool to not only improve compliance but also boost performance. ASC benchmarking can help leaders gain an objective understanding of how their facility performs against industry and internal standards. This data can then be leveraged to help shore up compliance, guide decisions on patient safety, establish new standards for service quality, and drive efficiencies that can feed the bottom line.
But where should you begin? Let’s explore which metrics to track, how to turn data insights into practical improvement strategies, and which tools and resources can simplify the benchmarking process.
To stay organized, it’s best to bucket ASC benchmarking into a few key areas: clinical, operational, financial, and patient experience.
Clinical benchmarks typically involve patient care, safety, and treatment within the facility. Tracking these metrics can help ASCs improve the quality of care, enhance patient safety, and ensure compliance with ASC standards, rules, and regulations.
Example ASC metrics include:
The rate of patient falls within the facility
The rate of patient burns
The rate of wrong-site, side, patient, procedure, or implant events
The rate of unplanned hospital visits within 7 days of surgery
The rate of patients who are transferred or admitted to a hospital after discharge
If your ASC performs specialty services, such as cataract surgery, you can set related metrics, such as the percentage of patients who experienced visual function improvement within 90 days.
Operational benchmarks measure resource usage, staff productivity, and process efficiency. This type of ASC benchmarking data can help you identify operational bottlenecks and inform new management strategies.
Examples include:
Length of time per procedure
Inventory turnover rate
Total patient turnover time
Labor efficiency across departments
Process cycle time (total time to complete a process)
Financial metrics reflect the organization's financial performance. These metrics provide an objective view of the revenue cycle and can help target and prioritize critical areas for improvement and cost centers in the ASC.
Examples include:
Days in A/R
A/R over 90 days
Clean claims rate
Revenue per case
Supply cost percentage of net revenue
Patient experience benchmarking can help shed light on patient satisfaction and how well patients feel they’ve been treated and cared for by staff from initial contact to discharge and beyond. This data can be gathered via surveys, focus groups, and patient feedback reports.
Examples include:
Appointment wait times
Staff responsiveness
Ease of scheduling
Facility cleanliness
Provider communication
Once you’ve identified the metrics you’d like to track, what can you compare them against? To gain a better understanding of key performance indicators (KPIs) and success, you can compare metrics against external data and internal data.
For external data, you can compare your data against industry benchmarks, such as national averages, publicly shared industry data, or even payer requirements. For example, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) provides quality information on ASCs through its Ambulatory Surgical Center Quality Reporting (ASCQR) Program.
The ASCQR Program collects and publicly reports data from Medicare-approved ASC facilities. While this is partly for patients, ASCs can also use the data to set benchmarks and improve performance. The ASCQR program provides ASC quality data by facility, state, and at the national level.
In addition, the Ambulatory Surgery Center Association (ASCA) provides benchmarking surveys that ASCs can use to track their own metrics and compare results against similar facilities. Accrediting bodies, like AAAHC, ACHC, QUAD A, and the Joint Commission, may also provide ASCs with industry benchmarks and other quality standards.
For internal data, it’s more up to what matters to your facility and its bottom line. For example, you could compare metrics year-over-year to track annual performance. Or, you could conduct site-to-site comparisons if your ASC is part of a larger healthcare network. For areas where you’d like to see faster improvement, you could gather quarterly or even monthly reports and make more agile adjustments to your improvement strategy as needed.
All in all, it’s best to conduct both external and internal benchmarking. Taking a balanced approach to ASC benchmarking can help paint a bigger, better, and more comprehensive picture of performance—one that provides more context and a more objective look at your ASC in today’s rapidly evolving healthcare landscape. This approach can also help you identify what truly matters to your facility, your staff, and your patients.
After collecting your metric data and comparing it against internal and external standards, what’s next? How can you turn that data into meaningful action?
First, you’ll want to conduct a gap analysis. This involves identifying where your performance data falls short of the benchmarks you’ve outlined. Once you’ve done this, reflect on the benchmarks you’ve set and ask yourself what goal you’re trying to achieve with them and why. This will help you prioritize which areas to focus on improving.
Then, you can start to dig a little deeper. Share the performance data with managerial staff and work with leaders to uncover root causes. It’s important to not only understand what the data is but why it is the way it is, and root cause analysis will help you get to the heart of performance trends.
Once you’ve identified the root causes, you can begin to translate findings into improvement plans. Try to make these plans as actionable as possible by outlining specific tasks and assigning owners responsible for overseeing or implementing them. Then, set a clear timeline, such as a quarter, six months, or a year.
At the end of the period, it’s time to revisit the benchmarks you’ve set. Has performance improved? How much progress has been made? What changes need to be implemented? Depending on the answers to these questions, you can then create a new, revised action plan or adjust your strategy as needed.
This process should be repeated regularly. By consistently tracking and measuring progress, you can build accountability across the organization, foster staff engagement, and cultivate a culture of continuous improvement.
ASC leaders who need support with benchmarking have a variety of options available to them. To start, you can access all publicly available ASC quality data on the CMS website. You can also find more information about ASC quality measures and how data is gathered here.
You can sign up for the ASCA’s clinical and operational benchmarking survey and salary and benefits survey to participate in and gain access to independently gathered peer data. Other ASC associations and accrediting bodies can also provide tools and resources to help you gain the data you need for ASC benchmarking.
The right software can also help. For example, electronic health record software can help you gain visibility into clinical performance, such as infection rates, which you can then compare against industry benchmarks. Compliance software, like SIS Comply, can provide actionable dashboards to help you track compliance, identify gaps, and gain insights into potential improvement strategies. And benchmarking software is specifically designed to streamline the process, including everything from setting KPIs and gathering data to analyzing trends and identifying key areas of improvement.
And if this all sounds like too much to get involved with, you can always turn to outsourcing or consulting support. Working with an experienced partner who specializes in ACS benchmarking can help you gain access to advanced performance analysis and unique insight. Such partners can simplify the process and distill insights into an actionable, practical improvement strategy for you, so your team can focus on what they do best: delivering safe, efficient, and high-quality patient care.
ASC benchmarking isn’t just a metric collection exercise—it’s a strategic leadership tool that can help ASCs stay compliant, competitive, safe, and efficient. And it’s never too late to start benchmarking or adjust your approach to it.
Think carefully about what metrics you’d like to track across the organization, set achievable goals and KPIs, and don’t be afraid to leverage the tools and resources available to you to help streamline the process. When you fully embrace data as an ASC leader, you can foster a culture of continuous improvement from the top down—one that inspires everyone on the team to deliver the highest-quality care to patients, which can only benefit the business.
Better benchmarks mean better outcomes. See how SIS Comply helps ASCs compare performance, strengthen compliance, and maximize efficiency.
Some common ASC quality measures include the percentage of patients who experience a burn prior to discharge, the percentage of those who experience a fall, the rate of unplanned hospital visits within 7 days of surgery, and the percentage of patients who experience a wrong site, wrong side, wrong procedure, or wrong implant event.
2. How can you track ASC benchmarking data?Benchmarking software provides an easy way to gather and monitor benchmarking data internally. You can also gain benchmarking data from CMS, third-party ASC organizations, and ASC accrediting bodies.
What is the purpose of ASC benchmarking?Benchmarking can help ASCs understand their performance, both internally and relative to other ASCs and healthcare organizations in the industry. It can fuel data-driven decision-making and encourage accountability among staff.
How can you get employees to care about ASC metrics?It’s critical to get buy-in from all employees. When everyone embraces a culture of continuous improvement, the entire organization can make significant progress. To cultivate this culture, ASC leaders can embrace this accountability and encourage a compliance-first mindset.