Home Health, News

CMS seeks to resolve issue involving Medicare Beneficiary Identifiers

Brought to you by Home Health Line.
CMS is working to resolve a claims system issue that, if left unresolved, may cause confusion for home health patients.
A system fix is scheduled for May 29 to resolve an issue where claims submitted for processing with a Health Insurance Claim Number (HICN) are being incorrectly displayed with Medicare Beneficiary Identifiers (MBIs) in Direct Data Entry (DDE).
With the claims issue, if providers submit subsequent claims using those MBIs, …

Hospice, News

Hospices’ scores improve on Hospice CAHPS measures

Brought to you by Home Health Line.

 

With Hospice CAHPS data, two measures ticked upward by 1% each in the latest refresh of Hospice Compare.

Hospice Compare was updated May 16. It gets refreshed quarterly.

Hospice CAHPS data were collected between July 1, 2015, and June 30, 2017.

View the upcoming issue of HHL for more details.

Measure

May 2018 score

February 2018 score

Emotional and spiritual support

89%

89%

Rating of this hospice

81%

80%

Willing to recommend this hospice

85%

84%

Treating patient with respect

91%

91%

Help for pain and symptoms

75%

75%

Communication …

News, Regulations, Skilled Nursing Facility

Skilled nursing facility fined for denying opioid-dependent patient

A Massachusetts skilled nursing facility was fined $5,000 after denying admission to a potential resident because he was taking Suboxone, a medication for the treatment of people who are dependent on opioids.
Although the facility, Charlwell House located in Norwood, MA, created policies in December 2016 stating that the facility would maintain the use of physician prescribed treatments for opioid use disorder (OUD), including Suboxone and methadone, a patient was turned away in November of 2017 …

Clinical concerns, Home Health, News, Quality of care

Longer home health visits may reduce rehospitalization risk, study shows

Brought to you by Home Health Line.
Agencies should consider scheduling visits earlier in the day for patients at higher risk for rehospitalization, a new study recommends.
This is because visits that are longer than usual by just one minute reduce the risk of hospital readmission by 8%, and the duration of home health visits tends to be impacted by order, the study from the National Bureau of Economic Research shows.
The study involved data collected between …