FUH: HEDIS Follow-Up After Hospitalization for Mental Illness
FUH is the HEDIS measure that tracks the percentage of acute inpatient psychiatric discharges with a documented outpatient mental health follow-up within 7 and 30 days. The strongest single predictor of psychiatric readmission risk.
How FUH is calculated
Denominator: acute inpatient discharges with a primary mental health diagnosis for members aged 6+. Two numerators:
- FUH 7-day — outpatient mental health visit within 7 days of discharge
- FUH 30-day — outpatient mental health visit within 30 days of discharge
Excluded: discharges to non-acute settings, transfers, or readmissions during the measurement period.
Why FUH performance matters
FUH is in HEDIS, MIPS Quality, MSSP / ACO REACH quality scoring, several state Medicaid quality bonus programs, and Medicare Advantage Star Ratings. Beyond the contract impact, FUH is the strongest single predictor of psychiatric readmission risk — patients without 7-day follow-up readmit at meaningfully higher rates.
The intervention pattern that moves FUH
Top-performing programs schedule the 7-day appointment before discharge, not after. Inpatient social work or care management owns the scheduling. The patient leaves the hospital with the appointment date and a transportation plan. Programs that try to schedule post-discharge typically hit 50-65%; programs that schedule pre-discharge hit 75-85%.
Where Vizier fits
Vizier joins inpatient psychiatric discharge data to outpatient BH visit data via the EHR connector and surfaces 7-day and 30-day FUH rates by facility, attending, and discharge unit. Patients within 5 days of the 7-day deadline without scheduled follow-up appear on the care management worklist.