HOSPICE and HOME HEALTH: CDC Issues Guidance on Strategies to Optimize PPE & Equipment, NAHC Forum of States Listserve, April 2, 2020 – On March 31, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issues guidance to health care professionals on Decontamination and Reuse of Filtering Facepiece Respirators using Contingency and Crisis Capacity Strategies. While disposable filtering facepiece respirators are not approved for routine decontamination and reuse as a standard of care, such action may be necessary as a crisis capacity strategy. This guidance discusses crisis standards of care for such decontamination and information regarding various methods for decontamination. We have had questions about use of KN-95 masks in lieu of N-95 masks.  On April 5, the FDA issued guidance which can be found here. 
 
HOSPICE and HOME HEALTH: NAHC Asks CMS/HHS for Reg Flexibility to Fight COVID-19, NAHC Report, April 3, 2020 – The National Association for Home Care & Hospice (NAHC) has made a series of requests to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) for regulatory action designed to enable home health and hospice to fulfill its potential as the health care setting most suited to stopping the spread of the novel coronavirus COVID-19 while continuing to treat needy patients.
 
HOSPICE and HOME HEALTH: Rising Employer Insurance Costs Due to COVID-19 Could Hit Hospices and Home Health, Hospice News, April 6, 2020
 
HOSPICE: CMS Waives Hospcie Rules During Pandemic, Further Expands Telehealth, Hospice News, April 1, 2020--The U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has waived a number of hospice regulations, including temporarily removing the requirement that a nurse conduct a home visit at least every two weeks and expanding the allowable use of telehealth.

HOME HEALTH and HOSPICE: Beneficiary Notice Delivery Guidance in Light of COVID-19, CMS List Serve, March 26, 2020 – In light of concerns related to COVID-19, current notice delivery instructions provide flexibilities for delivering notices to beneficiaries in isolation. 

HOME HEALTH and HOSPICE: CMS Provides Financial Relief for Medicare Providers – UPDATED,  VonLehman, April 7, 2020 – On March 28, 2020, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), recognizing providers’ need for resources to combat COVID-19, issued a release announcing an expansion of its accelerated and advance payment program for Medicare participating health care providers and suppliers. On April 3, 2020, the request forms were changed by the MACs and posted to their websites.  
 

HOME HEALTH: Home Health Data Report – March 2020, BKD, CPA & Advisors – This report provides key performance indicators (KPIs) to help assess performance under the home health Medicare Patient Driven Groupings Model (PDGM) compared to the Prospective Payment System (PPS). All data was compiled by BKD, LLP using the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) claims-OASIS limited data set from the 2020 final payment rule, which is composed of 2018 PPS claims and OASIS data repriced according to PDGM methodology. This data does not consider CMS behavior adjustments.

Use PDGM or RCD as the subject title.
 
If you need OCHCH to contact Palmetto GBA regarding a PCR NON-AFFIRMATION,
Please e-mail a short description and the UTN and your provider number.
DO NOT e-mail any info that could be non-compliant with the HIPAA regulations
 
Please check out the toolkits for PDGM and also RCD!
 
INFORMATION from the RCD ONLY Call on April 3, 2020:
OCHCH RCD Update: April 3rd, 2020;
RCD for Ohios Home Health Services Has Been PAUSED
 

• Hospice provider preview report: Review Hospice Item Set (HIS) quality measure results from the third quarter of 2018 to the second quarter of 2019

• Hospice Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS®) provider preview report: Review facility-level CAHPS survey results from the third quarter of 2017 to the second quarter of 2019

Review your results by April 13, prior to public display on the Hospice Compare website in May. If you believe the denominator or other HIS quality metric is inaccurate or if there are errors in the results from the CAHPS survey data, request a CMS review.
For More Information

• HIS Preview Report Access Instructions (PDF) 

• Hospice CAHPS Provider Preview Reports Access Instructions (PDF)

• HIS Preview Reports and Requests for CMS Review webpage

• CAHPS Preview Reports and Requests for CMS Review webpage