With the publishing of the 2026 home health payment rule on Dec. 2, 2025, requirements around determining a patient’s COVID-19 vaccine status have changed.
The OASIS-E2 instrument, expected to be implemented April 1, 2026, will not include the COVID-19 vaccine question, O0350.
But the 2026 HHPPS final rule notes that the requirements when completing this question have changed effective immediately.
Until the question is removed, any valid response (0—No, 1—Yes or a dash) will be acceptable on a transfer, death at home or discharge OASIS assessment. As long as the item has an acceptable response, there will be no future quality measure implications, according to CMS.
Note that the item can’t be left blank, as it would be rejected by the iQIES system under submission specifications.
The January 2026 Care Compare refresh will include public reporting on agency-level results for the COVID-19 question, but CMS notes in the final rule that this will be the only quarter when the results are publicly available.