MCAP™ Admission and Discharge Criteria
Originally developed from the Appropriateness Evaluation Protocol (AEP) used in Canada, USA and Europe, MCAP Criteria has been updated continuously since 1987 to reflect current and best clinical utilisation and case management practices.
The MCAP Criteria determine the most clinically suitable service-level-of-care for patient placement. Because MCAP Criteria are service-focused they apply equally well to simple and highly complex cases, including those with co-morbid or co-occurring conditions.
The criteria include 20 Medical/Surgical Criteria sets encompassing all relevant service-levels of care and 20 Mental Health Criteria sets encompassing psychiatry, substance misuse disorders, crisis, and outpatient services. The criteria can be used for admission review and continuing care during the patient’s treatment.
Benefits
MCAP Criteria are superior because, unlike any other Care and Resource Utilisation (CRU) product, they are focused on the individual patient needs. MCAP uses the intensity of services delivered to the patient based on the patient’s severity of overall illness as identified by the plan of care of the attending physician or care team to accurately determine the most appropriate service-level-of-care for patient placement.
Development
MCAP Criteria development has been ongoing since 1987. Prior to that time, many of the individuals who worked on the original MCAP Criteria participated in the development of the AEP (Appropriateness Evaluation Protocol) criteria, the first attempt to logically understand the reasons that patients are admitted to and continue to stay in acute care hospitals and to decrease the variability of reasons for admission and length of stay. MCAP was their second and most complete solution to this challenge. With all the in-depth work on the criteria each year since then and changes that have been made since their inception, MCAP criteria now represents the foremost thinking and most clinically justified appropriateness admission and discharge criteria in existence and is the leading nationally and internationally used and recognized criteria.
