EVALISYS PCS - Patient Classification and Workload Measures

Healthcare Staffing Decisions Made Easier

Frequently Asked Questions About PCS

Why should my organization have a PCS?

A patient classification system (PCS) is a method of determining, validating, and monitoring individual patient care requirements over time. A valid and reliable PCS can offer organizations:

A way to provide staffing flexibility
Balanced patient assignments
Effective staff utilization
A sound method for budget preparation and defense

A fully functional PCS can also help identify the true cost of care and establish appropriate cost management strategies. In addition, such a system can support the maintenance of care quality and compliance with regulatory standards.

Given public concern about the effects of cost-cutting on patient care quality, the PCS has become the primary professional vehicle for ensuring adequate staffing in all clinical settings and for all health disciplines. In California, in fact, acute care hospital licensure now requires a valid and reliable PCS that is tied to staffing on each shift and unit.

What does EVALISYS® PCS offer healthcare organizations?

Both EVALISYS PCS and EVALISYS PCS Plus (PCS and Study) offer workload measures, validity and reliability monitoring, PCS-related staffing, and an annual evaluation approach. Only EVALISYS PCS Plus, however, offers an objective Study process to validate actual workload and verify staff activity patterns, enabling you to improve productivity by assuring that each level of staff is being utilized in the most appropriate way.

How is EVALISYS PCS different from other systems?

There are two broad categories of PCS:

Summative task tools tend to be task and frequency-based. Because of their inherent focus on tasks, these tools have been at philosophical odds with the professional model that promotes expert judgment in an increasingly complex care environment. Summative task-based tools assume that standard patient care times are linear or additive and do not vary, and therefore do not reflect the natural variations in the amount of patient care actually provided.

Staffing projections made using these tools ignore the reality of continuous clinical decision-making, priority setting, and staff adjustments. The effects of skill mix on the amount of care delivered are not taken into account. And, by nature, the individual patient time model approach is not necessarily budget-related and may be based on time standards that are assumed to be constant at each care level for each unit—regardless of key factors such as length of stay, skill mix, care delivery model, cost, and competence.

The EVALISYS PCS, on the other hand, uses a care interaction model that reflects both the complexity and quantity of patient care, determining staffing based on the needs of the entire patient group. These tools encourage expert clinical judgment and quantification of care complexity in a brief, easy-to-use format. All versions of the EVALISYS PCS are care interaction methods designed to capture the complex reality of today’s care environment. They are the only PCS tools specifically designed for use in multidisciplinary settings.

The EVALISYS PCS staffing methodology recognizes the “step-mixed” reality of staffing requirements in which staff members adjust care priorities continuously throughout a work shift. The EVALISYS PCS staffing matrix methodology is less subject to the effects of inaccurate ratings. In addition, with this model, both minimum and maximum budget benchmarks are clearly identified to ensure that care standards and financial targets are met.