Physician Time Studies

Physician Time Studies allow Children’s Minnesota to claim physician time spent on administrative and teaching duties as facility costs, which is reported on the Medicaid/Medicare Cost report and is used by the State of Minnesota in rate setting. These costs are also used to substantiate our teaching related costs needed to retain our annual MERC distribution from the State of Minnesota. 

What to expect?

All employed physicians at Children's Minnesota will receive an email shortly before the reporting period begins which contains a personalized link to their survey. The time study is a record of all of the types of work activities that were performed by an individual on pre-determined days/weeks of the year. The goal is to use this sample of time to represent the percentage of time spent on different activity types throughout the year. In order to be considered accurate and reliable data, the time study must be detailed enough to identify what services the physician was providing during each of the selected days. 

Time Study Instructions and Worksheet

Time Study Reporting Periods for 2025:

Q1: 1/11/25-1/24/25

Q2: 5/3/25-5/16/25

Q3: 7/19/25-8/1/25

Q4: 12/6/25-12/19/25

Time Study Reporting Periods for 2024:

Q1: 2/10-2/23/2024

Q2: 6/1-6/14/2024

Q3: 8/3-8/16/2024

Q4: 10/26-11/8/2024

Time Study Reporting Periods for 2023:

Q1/Q2: 4/1-4/7/2023 (still under PHE reporting requirements 1 week every 6 months)

Q3: 7/15-7/28/2023

Q4: 12/2-12/15/2023