Novari ATC Priority Categories

Understanding Novari ATC Priority Categories

Priority categories are different from priority codes. Priority codes, generally 1, 2, 3, 4, are set for each procedure and determine the target date within which surgery should be completed. These can vary from service to service, from procedure to procedure, and from oncology to non-oncology cases.

Priority categories are used to summarize wait time reporting. It is impossible to create meaningful rollup reports using priority codes because the wait time for one procedure with priority 2 may be totally different from the wait time for another procedure with priority 2. For example, vitrectomy. It has a priority 2 with a target of 7 days. An ortho hip or knee priority 2 has a target of 42 days, which is equal to a priority 3 vitrectomy. This means they should both be of the same urgency: a P3 vitrectomy = 42 and a P2 hip/knee = 42 days. Corneal transplant is another good example. A priority 2 for Corneal Transplant is within 4 weeks. However, a Glaucoma priority 2 is within 2 weeks.

Trying to do any comparisons based on priority code is like comparing apples to oranges. By creating priority categories, like urgencies are grouped together. You can easily see the number of cases that are more and less urgent based on their time groups and if those target intervals were met. This time-based grouping allows for statistical analysis (min, max, avg, med), percentages and totals because like urgencies are being compared.

Below are the standard priority categories. Notice each priority category is assigned a date range. This allows for cases with various priority codes, as described above, with similar target timeframes to be grouped and summarized. Using the example below, any case with target times between 1 and 56 days, regardless of its priority code, will be grouped in Priority Category 2.

Priority categories are used in some reports, on the Provider’s Office dashboard and View List QuickStats to summarize cases by their priority category groups. These are described in more detail below.

Reports Using Priority Categories

Active Priority Analysis

The Active Priority Analysis report uses the priority categories and, technically, the actual target time, but the target time is only used for ordering the priority categories from left to right when outputting the report (the actual target times are not calculated against) – this is for Wait 2 only.

Target Time Compliance Percentage

The Target Time Compliance Percentages report groups by priority categories – this is for Wait 2 only.

Procedure Profile

The first section of the Procedure Profile report uses the priority categories to group the sections – this is for Wait 2.

The Procedure Profile report utilizes the priority categories in the two bar charts (the bright neon green, the right most bars in the Wait Times by Priority Category chart are the exact priority category target times of 1, 56, 112, and 182) – this is for Wait 2.

The last section on the Procedure Profile report breaks down the waiting by priority category – this is for Wait 2.

In the export version of this report, the fourth column has the target days shown. The rest of the report utilizes the categories the same way as the HTML report – this is for Wait 2.

List Status by Provider

This is for Wait 2.

Completed Cases by Procedure

This is for Wait 2. Please note there are only values for Priority Categories 1, 2, and 3.

Wait Time Summary by Procedure

This is for Wait 2.

Provider’s Office

For the Wait 1 Performance chart, the priority groupings are by priority category. Having mismatching priority categories for oncology vs. non-oncology will show eight different categories; they are specifically grouped based on the “Priority Category” field.

For the Wait 2 Percentages of Cases Completed within Targets chart, clicking on a specific month, we see the breakdown by priority category. This is categorized based on the “Priority Category”, so incorrect/different naming schemes will separate these out in reports.

The Wait 2: Median Wait Time badge at the bottom is also by priority category.

QuickStats Report

The Priority Analysis on the QuickStats report uses and shows the target times and the procedure category in the left column (this is only for Wait 2).