URAC Core 9 -- Staff Assessment Program -- v. 2.1 revision

The change to Core 9 from v. 2.0 to v. 2.1 is subtle -- the words are identical, but the organization is changed. The original language was as follows:

The organization maintains a formal assessment program for individual staff members that includes an annual performance appraisal and a review of relevant documentation produced by that individual staff member. (Secondary)

The new version breaks that standard up into three components:

The organization maintains a formal assessment program for individual staff members that includes: (Secondary)

(a) An annual performance appraisal; (Secondary) and

(b) a review of relevant documentation produced by that individual staff member. (Secondary)

This change accomplishes two things. First, it helps the reviewer with scoring. Under the v. 2.0 standard, if an organization had annual performance appraisals but no review of documents submitted by the staff member, do they get credit for this secondary element, or not? By breaking the standard into its component parts, URAC is helping the reviewer make these determinations so that scoring is more consistent and accurate. Under the URAC protocol, if you miss one secondary element, you receive a 3 out of a possible 4 on the rating. If you miss two secondary elements, you receive a rating of 2 on the 4-point scale.

To see how this works, here's the scoring under the new standard:

• Organization has all the elements of the stnadard (formal assessment program, annual appraisals, review of documentation). Rating=4, multiplied by the weight of 3, for a score of 12.
• Organization has an assessment program with annual appraisals, but no review of the staff member's documentation. Rating=3, times weight of 3, for a score of 9.
• Organization has an assessment program, but the appraisals are not annual and there is no review of the staff member's documentation. Rating=2, times weight of 3, for a score of 6.

This kind of discernment between organizations at varying levels of compliance with this standard was not possible in the 2.0 version.