CMS Reinforces Hospice Regulatory, Fraud Focus

Yesterday, CMS dropped a memo to state survey agencies titled, “Ensuring Consistency in the Hospice Survey Process to Identify Quality of Care Concerns and Potential Fraud Referrals”. The memo is available here: qso-25-06-hospice According to CMS, the memorandum aims to bolster current mechanisms for detecting instances where a hospice provider’s failure to adhere to the … Read more

New SNF Conditions of Participation: Implementation Timeframes

About ten days ago, I published a post regarding the new Federal Conditions of Participation for SNFs.  This long awaited regulatory update includes new, revised, and existing regulations published in final rule form last week (October 4).  The post is here for reference http://wp.me/ptUlY-kL The questions frequently asked regarding the new CoPs (since release) are around implementation dates.  As readers will note, whether … Read more

CMS Releases Final Rule on SNF Conditions of Participation

The long-awaited final rule on the revised/new SNF Conditions of Participation is set for publishing on October 4 in the Federal Register. The public inspection version is available now, including the comments from the Proposed Rule at this link: https://s3.amazonaws.com/public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2016-23503.pdf  The whole document is over 900 pages.  The salient portions that include the regulatory changes/summary … Read more

Upcoming Webinar: CMS Proposed Reform Rule for SNFs

On August 20th, I will be conducting a webinar for HcPro on the CMS proposed rule to overhaul the existing federal Conditions of Participation for SNFs. Of a current 366 sections with the Code, CMS is proposing to change 212 sections.  This is the most sweeping overhaul of the federal code for SNFs since OBRA and PPS … Read more