Health
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Hospital Circular 9/1998

Date Issued: 17 June 1998
Publication: 9/1998
Contact: Regional Office
Distribution:

Subject/s: AIMS Statistical Reporting 1998-99
Purpose: To provide details of changes in AIMS reporting from 1 July 1998

The Agency Information Management System (AIMS) Agency Module collects aggregate statistical and financial data associated with Health Service Agreements entered into by public and denominational hospitals. The system is revised annually to reflect new reporting requirements. The 1998-99 version (AIMS 98) will be rolled out from July and will be the last supporting a Windows 3.1x platform. The 1999/2000 Agency Module will be a 32 bit application running on Windows 95 as a minimum configuration. This is necessary to support current technology and Year 2000 compliance (see later).

Updates to the AIMS Agency Module, the Software Guide and the Public Hospital User Manual Version 6.0 will be distributed to all funded agencies in July and August 1998. It is intended to distribute AIMS 98 on CD media. If your agency does not have access to CD facilities and require floppy disks please contact David Debono, Acute Health, 17/555 Collins Street, Melbourne, 3000, phone (03) 9616 8650 or email david.debono@dhs.vic.gov.au.

The major changes for 1998-99 (effective 1 July 1998) are:

There are also modifications to five returns:

Specific changes to these forms are detailed in the sections below. Copies of the new and revised forms are attached.

Aged Care Services

Two new forms have been introduced:

Changes have also been made to two existing returns:

Primary Health Program Services

The AIMS system has been expanded to include reporting requirements for the Primary Health Program services introduced by the Department for the 1998-99 financial year. These reporting requirements apply to all agencies which have a Primary Health Program Service Plan attached to their respective Health Service Agreement and will be consistent with data collected by Community Health Centres through the SWITCH system. The data will provide core information on service inputs and outputs and some selective socio-demographic characteristics of clients.

Hospital-based community service providers will be required to submit both annual and monthly reports in the formats specified below.

Annual Reports

All directly funded agencies will be required to complete and forward to the Department an Annual Statistical Return by 30 September 1998. This report will provide an overall summary of achieved levels of annual service provision and information on agencies’ staffing and associated funding profiles for the 1997-98 financial year. The core data items to be captured include:

Monthly Reports

Monthly based community health program data must be submitted by the 7th working day of the following month. These reports will provide aggregate service provision data that will permit the Department to monitor individual agencies’ performance in meeting annual targets in service provision. The required reports are as follows:

Further information concerning the required reports and definitions of activity measures are available in the Primary Health Program Guidelines and the AIMS Manual.

These reporting requirements apply only to agencies which have a Primary Health Program Service Plan attached to their respective Health Service Agreements. Other agencies which receive indirect funds, that is, Primary Health Program funds which have been pooled together with funds from other sources and administered by programs other than the Primary Health Program, are exempt from these reporting requirements. These agencies will have reporting requirements determined by the administering program.

Note 1: Although the Primary Health Program Guidelines require these reports on a quarterly basis, it is mandatory for hospital-based community health returns to be submitted each month for hospital, Commonwealth and other statutory purposes.

Note 2: Hospitals that purchase services from Dental Health Services or Drug Treatment Services must complete the Coordinated Care Return for Non-Admitted Patients (Form 114/S2).

For further information on Primary Health Program reporting requirements please contact your regional office.

Domiciliary Postnatal Services

Postnatal domiciliary care is integral to the obstetric episode of care. The bundled casemix payments for postnatal domiciliary services which currently apply to all obstetric DRGs, take account of the close connection between hospital length of stay and postnatal support services. The majority of postnatal domiciliary visits occur within the first few days following the separation of the admitted patient episode and involve care provided by a registered nurse/midwife.

In the 1998-99 budget the Government has provided an additional $12.9 million for a Maternity Services Enhancement Strategy. A significant proportion of this funding will be available to all hospitals providing maternity services, for improved postnatal care and support services which are designed to better respond to the individual needs of women and babies. In association with the implementation of this strategy, hospitals will be required to provide additional data on postnatal domiciliary care.

As of 1 July 1998, new patient-level activity data will need to be collected on postnatal domiciliary service utilisation. This data will be linked to that recorded in the VIMD, to enable tracking of episodes of care across hospital and domiciliary services. Hospitals are required to complete the new Domiciliary Postnatal Services return (AIMS Form 111/D1) and submit to the Department by the 21st day following the end of the reporting month. The data for each month will apply only to those patients who have completed the care episode and are formally discharged from the domiciliary postnatal service during the relevant reporting month.

The arrangements for postnatal domiciliary services to mothers and babies are the responsibility of the hospital discharging the mother following child birth. The discharging hospital is responsible for completing the Domiciliary Postnatal Services return.

Data items required for the data collection are:

The collection of aggregate postnatal domiciliary occasions of service data currently reported on the AIMS Acute Health Non-Admitted Patient Return (Form 111/S2) needs to continue as part of the State’s responsibilities under the existing Commonwealth/State Agreements.

To assist hospitals implement new data collection systems, a lead time of three months will be allowed up to 30 September 1998. All data from the first quarter will be required, however reporting may be delayed until 21 October 1998. At which time it will be expected that each hospital will have an effective system for subsequent monthly returns.

Any queries regarding the Domiciliary Postnatal Services return should be directed to Ms Kim Hider, Acute Health Division, phone (03) 9616 7594 or email kim.hider@dhs.vic.gov.au.

Drug Treatment Services

Three additional service types have been included on the Non-Admitted Patients return (Form 114/S2):

These services have been operating in rural Victoria since 1996 and provide supportive care, medical care and pharmacotherapy. Rural Withdrawal may include a short period of hospital-based withdrawal (if required) with a follow-up period of home-based or outpatient care. Only the non-admitted component of this service type should be reported in Form114/S2.

Alcohol and Drug Supported Accommodation services were put to tender for the first time in 1997. They provide a supportive environment to help clients achieve lasting change and assist their reintegration into community living. Supported accommodation services are provided with a minimum of a day support worker, from a community-based setting, usually with public housing.

Youth Outreach Services were also tendered for the first time in 1997. They provide assessment, support and ongoing coordination to young people with alcohol and drug problems, in their own environment. They will also support generalist agencies that work with young people, through information, education and training.

Finance Return

The changes to the Finance Return (Form F1) are as follows:

There is no change to the Annual Return.

Please Note: the Annual Report introduced in June this year will be continued in 1998/99.

Registration Details

There are minor changes to the layout of the A1 Registration Form.

Year 2000 Compliance

A number of queries are being received regarding Year 2000 compliance of AIMS. The Management Information Unit, Acute Health Division can provide an assurance that AIMS 98 will not encounter year 2000 problems provided:

AIMS date functions are dependant upon local environmental factors including:

The IDAPI version currently in use (2.5) is not recognised as Y2K compliant. This is a 16 bit application and Borland have no plans to update their 16 bit products to Y2K compliance. Consequently Borland 16 bit products will shortly be redundant. The Borland Database Engine version 4.5 is Y2K compliant but supports 32 bit applications only.

The new return for Domiciliary Postnatal Services is the only return with date fields in the AIMS data entry process. The only date calculation performed by the AIMS system is in the Compliance Report (Systems Report) and is of a non-critical nature. Providing the local environmental system settings are correct, date functions and calculations, if required, should be performed adequately. No assurance can be given on any end-user ad-hoc query or reporting functions as they are outside of the control of the AIMS development process.

As mentioned earlier Acute Health will deliver a 32 bit AIMS application for 1999/2000 financial year which will utilise the compliant database engine. At this point a more complete statement on Year 2000 Compliance will be possible. Please Note: Agencies that have existing Paradox applications will need to ensure that versions of IDAPI or the Borland Database Engine earlier than version 4.5 are removed and Paradox is upgraded to version 7 or later.

New and Revised AIMS Forms for 1998/99

These Forms can be downloaded as PDF files by clicking on the links. To view and print PDF files you'll need the Abobe Acrobat Reader: Get Acrobat reader
Form Title Form Code
Aged Care Employment E3
Aged Care HACC Funded Clients 113H1
Aged Care Non-Admitted Patients 113S2
Aged Care Residential Services 113S5
Coordinated Care Non-Admitted Patients 114S2
Community Health Coordination Annual Return ARCH 1, ARCH 2 & ARCH 3
Community Health Coordination Monthly Return C1, C2, C3, C4
Domiciliary Postnatal Services 111D1
Financial Return F1 part 1 F1 part 2 F1 part 3 F1 part 4

DR CHRIS BROOK
DIRECTOR
ACUTE HEALTH

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