Home Health Line
11/10/2014
The PPS final rule for 2015 — posted by CMS on Oct. 30 — eliminates the physician narrative and instead relies on patient information in the physician’s or facility’s files to determine patient eligibility for home health.
 
11/10/2014
CMS is following through with plans to simplify therapy reassessment requirements, and the final rule is less stringent than what was proposed. 
 
11/10/2014
You’ll no longer get case-mix points for 200 codes in the pulmonary, psych 1, psych 2 and blindness/low vision diagnosis categories as well as two OASIS items starting Jan. 1 — and CMS says the responsibility rests solely with the home health industry.
 
 
11/10/2014
Your agency’s quality and clinical managers better get familiar with the OASIS validation logs generated by CMS’ new Assessment Submission and Processing (ASAP) system. Those reports will be the key to preventing reduced payments for failure to meet minimum OASIS submission requirements.
 
11/10/2014
About 30% of physical therapy visits were provided by an assistant and about 15% of occupational therapy visits were provided by an assistant in 2013, CMS data show.
11/10/2014
CMS projects Medicare payments to agencies will be reduced by 0.30% — $60 million — in 2015, according to the final 2015 PPS rule.
 
 
11/10/2014
by: CMS
Agencies in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas will feel the biggest impact from the final rule’s policies, with an average payment reduction in 2015 of 3.0%. Agencies in most other parts of the country fared slightly better under the final rule. Those within New England the Mountain regions will receive 1.6% more.
 
 
11/10/2014
by: CMS
Next year’s national per-visit amounts for low-utilization payment adjustment (LUPA) episodes will be slightly above the final rates for 2014 across all disciplines, according to the final 2015 PPS rule.
11/10/2014
by: CMS
The HHL team has compiled this quick-reference tool to help you evaluate the major provisions of CMS’ final PPS rule. The following changes will take effect in 2015.
11/10/2014
Agencies will want to make sure they contact their vendors, who will be handling most of the transition to CMS’ new Assessment Submission and Processing (ASAP) system, to ensure they are ready for the transition on 12 a.m. EST Jan. 1.
 
 

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