210 ILCS 86/ Hospital Report Card Act.

(210 ILCS 86/1)

Sec. 1. Short title. This Act may be cited as the Hospital Report Card Act.

(Source: P.A. 93-563, eff. 1-1-04.)

(210 ILCS 86/5)

Sec. 5. Findings. The General Assembly finds that Illinois consumers have a right to access information about the quality of health care provided in Illinois hospitals in order to make better decisions about their choice of health care provider.

(Source: P.A. 93-563, eff. 1-1-04.)

(210 ILCS 86/10)

Sec. 10. Definitions. For the purpose of this Act:

"Average daily census" means the average number of inpatients receiving service on any given 24-hour period beginning at midnight in each clinical service area of the hospital.

"Clinical service area" means a grouping of clinical services by a generic class of various types or levels of support functions, equipment, care, or treatment provided to inpatients. Hospitals may have, but are not required to have, the following categories of service: behavioral health, critical care, maternal-child care, medical-surgical, pediatrics, perioperative services, and telemetry.

"Department" means the Department of Public Health.

"Direct-care nurse" and "direct-care nursing staff" includes any registered nurse, licensed practical nurse, or assistive nursing personnel with direct responsibility to oversee or carry out medical regimens or nursing care for one or more patient.

"Hospital" means a health care facility licensed under the Hospital Licensing Act.

"Nursing care" means care that falls within the scope of practice set forth in the Nurse Practice Act or is otherwise encompassed within recognized professional standards of nursing practice, including assessment, nursing diagnosis, planning, intervention, evaluation, and patient advocacy.

"Retaliate" means to discipline, discharge, suspend, demote, harass, deny employment or promotion, lay off, or take any other adverse action against direct-care nursing staff as a result of that nursing staff taking any action described in this Act.

"Skill mix" means the differences in licensing, specialty, and experiences among direct-care nurses.

"Staffing levels" means the numerical nurse to patient ratio by licensed nurse classification within a nursing department or unit.

"Unit" means a functional division or area of a hospital in which nursing care is provided.

(Source: P.A. 95-639, eff. 10-5-07.)

(210 ILCS 86/15)

Sec. 15. Staffing levels.

(a) The number of registered professional nurses, licensed practical nurses, and other nursing personnel assigned to each patient care unit shall be consistent with the types of nursing care needed by the patients and the capabilities of the staff. Patients on each unit shall be evaluated near the end of each change of shift by criteria developed by the nursing service. There shall be staffing schedules reflecting actual nursing personnel required for the hospital and for each patient unit. Staffing patterns shall reflect consideration of nursing goals, standards of nursing practice, and the needs of the patients.

(b) Current nursing staff schedules shall be available upon request at each patient care unit. Each schedule shall list the daily assigned nursing personnel and average daily census for the unit. The actual nurse staffing assignment roster for each patient care unit shall be available upon request at the patient care unit for the effective date of that roster. Upon the roster's expiration, the hospital shall retain the roster for 5 years from the date of its expiration.

(c) All records required under this Section, including anticipated staffing schedules and the methods to determine and adjust staffing levels shall be made available to the public upon request.

(d) All records required under this Section shall be maintained by the facility for no less than 5 years.

(Source: P.A. 93-563, eff. 1-1-04.)

(210 ILCS 86/20)

Sec. 20. Orientation and training.

(a) All health care facilities shall have established an orientation process that provides initial job training and information and assesses the direct care nursing staff's ability to fulfill specified responsibilities.

(b) Personnel not competent for a given unit shall not be assigned to work there without direct supervision until appropriately trained.

(c) Staff training information will be available upon request, without any information identifying a patient, employee, or licensed professional at the hospital.

(Source: P.A. 93-563, eff. 1-1-04.)

(210 ILCS 86/25)

Sec. 25. Hospital reports.

(a) Individual hospitals shall prepare a quarterly report including all of the following:

(1) Nursing hours per patient day, average daily census, and average daily hours worked for each clinical service area.

(2) Infection-related measures for the facility for the specific clinical procedures and devices determined by the Department by rule under 2 or more of the following categories:

(A) Surgical procedure outcome measures.

(B) Surgical procedure infection control process measures.

(C) Outcome or process measures related to ventilator-associated pneumonia.

(D) Central vascular catheter-related bloodstream infection rates in designated critical care units.

(3) Information required under paragraph (4) of Section 2310-312 of the Department of Public Health Powers and Duties Law of the Civil Administrative Code of Illinois.

(4) Additional infection measures mandated by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services that are reported by hospitals to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Healthcare Safety Network surveillance system, or its successor, and deemed relevant to patient safety by the Department.

(5) Each instance of preterm birth and infant mortality within the reporting period, including the racial and ethnic information of the mothers of those infants.

(6) Each instance of maternal mortality within the reporting period, including the racial and ethnic information of those mothers.

(7) The number of female patients who have died within the reporting period.

(8) The number of female patients admitted to the hospital with a diagnosis of COVID-19 and at least one known underlying condition identified by the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as a condition that increases the risk of mortality from COVID-19 who subsequently died at the hospital within the reporting period.

The infection-related measures developed by the Department shall be based upon measures and methods developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, or the National Quality Forum. The Department may align the infection-related measures with the measures and methods developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, and the National Quality Forum by adding reporting measures based on national health care strategies and measures deemed scientifically reliable and valid for public reporting. The Department shall receive approval from the State Board of Health to retire measures deemed no longer scientifically valid or valuable for informing quality improvement or infection prevention efforts. The Department shall notify the Chairs and Minority Spokespersons of the House Human Services Committee and the Senate Public Health Committee of its intent to have the State Board of Health take action to retire measures no later than 7 business days before the meeting of the State Board of Health.

The Department shall include interpretive guidelines for infection-related indicators and, when available, shall include relevant benchmark information published by national organizations.

The Department shall collect the information reported under paragraphs (5) and (6) and shall use it to illustrate the disparity of those occurrences across different racial and ethnic groups.

(b) Individual hospitals shall prepare annual reports including vacancy and turnover rates for licensed nurses per clinical service area.

(c) None of the information the Department discloses to the public may be made available in any form or fashion unless the information has been reviewed, adjusted, and validated according to the following process:

(1) The Department shall organize an advisory committee, including representatives from the Department, public and private hospitals, direct care nursing staff, physicians, academic researchers, consumers, health insurance companies, organized labor, and organizations representing hospitals and physicians. The advisory committee must be meaningfully involved in the development of all aspects of the Department's methodology for collecting, analyzing, and disclosing the information collected under this Act, including collection methods, formatting, and methods and means for release and dissemination.

(2) The entire methodology for collecting and analyzing the data shall be disclosed to all relevant organizations and to all hospitals that are the subject of any information to be made available to the public before any public disclosure of such information.

(3) Data collection and analytical methodologies shall be used that meet accepted standards of validity and reliability before any information is made available to the public.

(4) The limitations of the data sources and analytic methodologies used to develop comparative hospital information shall be clearly identified and acknowledged, including but not limited to the appropriate and inappropriate uses of the data.

(5) To the greatest extent possible, comparative hospital information initiatives shall use standard-based norms derived from widely accepted provider-developed practice guidelines.

(6) Comparative hospital information and other information that the Department has compiled regarding hospitals shall be shared with the hospitals under review prior to public dissemination of such information and these hospitals have 30 days to make corrections and to add helpful explanatory comments about the information before the publication.

(7) Comparisons among hospitals shall adjust for patient case mix and other relevant risk factors and control for provider peer groups, when appropriate.

(8) Effective safeguards to protect against the unauthorized use or disclosure of hospital information shall be developed and implemented.

(9) Effective safeguards to protect against the dissemination of inconsistent, incomplete, invalid, inaccurate, or subjective hospital data shall be developed and implemented.

(10) The quality and accuracy of hospital information reported under this Act and its data collection, analysis, and dissemination methodologies shall be evaluated regularly.

(11) Only the most basic identifying information from mandatory reports shall be used, and information identifying a patient, employee, or licensed professional shall not be released. None of the information the Department discloses to the public under this Act may be used to establish a standard of care in a private civil action.

(d) Quarterly reports shall be submitted, in a format set forth in rules adopted by the Department, to the Department by April 30, July 31, October 31, and January 31 each year for the previous quarter. Data in quarterly reports must cover a period ending not earlier than one month prior to submission of the report. Annual reports shall be submitted by December 31 in a format set forth in rules adopted by the Department to the Department. All reports shall be made available to the public on-site and through the Department.

(e) If the hospital is a division or subsidiary of another entity that owns or operates other hospitals or related organizations, the annual public disclosure report shall be for the specific division or subsidiary and not for the other entity.

(f) The Department shall disclose information under this Section in accordance with provisions for inspection and copying of public records required by the Freedom of Information Act provided that such information satisfies the provisions of subsection (c) of this Section.

(g) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, under no circumstances shall the Department disclose information obtained from a hospital that is confidential under Part 21 of Article VIII of the Code of Civil Procedure.

(h) No hospital report or Department disclosure may contain information identifying a patient, employee, or licensed professional.

(Source: P.A. 101-446, eff. 8-23-19; 102-256, eff. 1-1-22.)

(210 ILCS 86/30)

Sec. 30. Department reports. The Department of Public Health shall annually submit to the General Assembly a report summarizing the quarterly reports by health service area and shall publish that report on its website. The Department of Public Health may issue quarterly informational bulletins at its discretion, summarizing all or part of the information submitted in these quarterly reports. The Department shall publish quality and safety measures on major public health problems, such as cardiovascular disease and diabetes, that have been vetted by the National Quality Forum, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The Department shall also publish risk-adjusted mortality rates for each hospital based upon information hospitals have already submitted to the Department pursuant to their obligations to report health care information under other public health reporting laws and regulations outside of this Act. The published mortality rates must comply with the hospital data publication process contained in subsection (c) of Section 25 of this Act.

(Source: P.A. 99-326, eff. 8-10-15.)

(210 ILCS 86/35)

Sec. 35. Whistleblower protections.

(a) A hospital covered by this Act shall not penalize, discriminate, or retaliate in any manner against an employee with respect to compensation or the terms, conditions, or privileges of employment who in good faith, individually or in conjunction with another person or persons, does any of the following or intimidate, threaten, or punish an employee to prevent him or her from doing any of the following:

(1) Discloses to the nursing staff supervisor or manager, a private accreditation organization, the nurse's collective bargaining agent, or a regulatory agency any activity, policy, or practice of a hospital that violates this Act or any other law or rule or that the employee reasonably believes poses a risk to the health, safety, or welfare of a patient or the public.

(2) Initiates, cooperates, or otherwise participates in an investigation or proceeding brought by a regulatory agency or private accreditation body concerning matters covered by this Act or any other law or rule or that the employee reasonably believes poses a risk to the health, safety, or welfare of a patient or the public.

(3) Objects to or refuses to participate in any activity, policy, or practice of a hospital that violates this Act or any law or rule of the Department or that a reasonable person would believe poses a risk to the health, safety, or welfare of a patient or the public.

(4) Participates in a committee or peer review process or files a report or complaint that discusses allegation of unsafe, dangerous, or potentially dangerous care within the hospital.

(b) For the purposes of this Section, an employee is presumed to act in good faith if the employee reasonably believes that (i) the information reported or disclosed is true and (ii) a violation has occurred or may occur. An employee is not acting in good faith under this Section if the employee's report or action was based on information that the employee should reasonably know is false or misleading. The protection of this Section shall also not apply to an employee unless the employee gives written notice to a hospital manager of the activity, policy, practice, or violation that the employee believes poses a risk to the health of a patient or the public and provides the manager a reasonable opportunity to correct the problem. The manager shall respond in writing to the employee within 7 days acknowledging that the notice was received and provide written notice of any action taken within a reasonable time of receiving the employee's notice. This notice requirement shall not apply if the employee is reasonably certain that the activity, policy, practice, or violation: (i) is known by one or more hospital managers who have had an opportunity to correct the problem and have not done so; (ii) involves the commission of a crime; or (iii) places patient health or safety in severe and immediate danger. The notice requirement shall not apply if the employee is participating in a survey, investigation, or other activity of a regulatory agency, law enforcement agency, or private accreditation body that was not initiated by the employee. Nothing in this Section prohibits a hospital from training, educating, correcting, or otherwise taking action to improve the performance of employees who report that they are unable or unwilling to perform an assigned task.

(Source: P.A. 93-563, eff. 1-1-04.)

(210 ILCS 86/40)

Sec. 40. Private right of action. Any health care facility that violates the provisions of Section 35 may be held liable to the employee affected in an action brought in a court of competent jurisdiction for such legal or equitable relief as may be appropriate to effectuate the purposes of this Act.

(Source: P.A. 93-563, eff. 1-1-04.)

(210 ILCS 86/45)

Sec. 45. Regulatory oversight. The Department shall be responsible for ensuring compliance with this Act as a condition of licensure under the Hospital Licensing Act and shall enforce such compliance according to the provisions of the Hospital Licensing Act.

(Source: P.A. 93-563, eff. 1-1-04.)

(210 ILCS 86/90)

Sec. 90. (Amendatory provisions; text omitted).

(Source: P.A. 93-563, eff. 1-1-04; text omitted.)

(210 ILCS 86/99)

Sec. 99. Effective date. This Act takes effect on January 1, 2004.

(Source: P.A. 93-563, eff. 1-1-04.)