Online resource packed with regulatory news and expert guidance, tips & tools pertinent to professionals across the post-acute care continuum.
A plethora of laboratories across the United States are rapidly producing COVID-19 tests, but a recent record check by CMS resulted in 171 cease and desist letters to labs, halting production of tests at labs without the proper qualifications. The record check found that those labs did not have up-to-date Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments of […]
CMS released a final rule [CMS-1737-F] on July 31 for FY 2021 that updates the Medicare payment rates and the value-based purchasing program for SNFs. The rule includes routine technical rate-setting updates to the SNF PPS payment rates, finalizes adoption of the most recent OMB statistical area delineations, and applies a 5 percent cap on […]
Concerns regarding compliance with quality and safety standards under the Hospice Conditions of Participation were addressed through legislation recently introduced by two members of the House Ways & Means Committee, Rep. Jimmy Panetta and Rep. Tom Reed. The legislation entitled, “Helping Our Senior Population in Comfort Environments Act (HOSPICE Act),” was scheduled to be marked […]
Having an ombudsman on site during state surveys may lead to lower building quality scores for SNFs, according to a study published in the October issue of the Journal of the American Medical Directors Association (JAMDA). While JAMDA researchers note the importance of ombudsmen in a SNF as resident advocates, the study, entitled , “The […]
During the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission’s (MedPAC) public meeting on Thursday, March 1, analyst Evan Christman reviewed options for modifying Medicare’s hospital discharge rules to encourage beneficiaries to use higher-quality PAC providers. Christman pointed out that Medicare assigns responsibility for discharge planning to the hospital, and while part of this responsibility includes providing the beneficiary […]
This post is an excerpt taken from HCPro’s infection control guide, Infection Control: How to Implement an Effective Approach for Long-Term Care, written by subject matter expert Brian Garavaglia, PhD, FACHCA. Adults bring a lifetime of experience to the learning situation, and most of them are capable of self-direction. They often relate the development of […]
Last week, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released their List of Measures under Consideration (MUC) for 2018 pre-rule making. CMS officials capped the measures at 32, more than 100 shy of the 184 measures submitted for consideration by stakeholders during an open call for measures. Each year, CMS publishes a list of […]
Listen in on Tuesday, November 14 as HCPro’s post-acute care regulatory specialist Stefanie Corbett, DHA dives into how to make the transition to an alarm-free facility without compromising resident safety, including how to utilize your QAPI programs to understand root causes for falls, regulatory guidance, and how to achieve culture change through alarm elimination. Click here to […]
Between 2013 and 2015, researchers interviewed more than 11,000 residents living in Kansas nursing homes that promoted person-centered care practices. The interview questions were split up into four topics: quality of life, quality of care, quality of services, and global satisfaction subdomains. The study, published in The Journal of Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine, provides […]
CMS’ final evaluation report of phase one of their Initiative to Reduce Avoidable Hospitalizations among Nursing Facility (NF) Residents found that intervention sites with a full-time nurse at each facility providing direct care to residents had the strongest improvements in both cost and quality. These models demonstrated greater changes in facility culture, greater support for […]