Home Health & Hospice Week

Agency turns a deaf ear to many criticisms in 2020 final rule.

Hospice providers that read Medicare’s 2020 proposed rule for the industry should already be pretty familiar with the final rule released July 31, since the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services persists with the original provisions without major changes.

For example: CMS sticks to its rebalancing guns, reducing payment rates for routine home care and increasing rates for the other three levels — continuous home care, general inpatient care, and inpatient respite care. That change comes despite the industry’s criticism that shifting reimbursement to GIP care is basically a pass-through to the facilities that host it, rather than an increase to hospices (see Eli’s HCW, Vol. XXVIII, No. 15).

CMS also continues with its plan to require an addendum for the election statement, make changes to wage index methodology, and develop claims-based quality measures, among other provisions, according to the rule scheduled for publication in the Aug. 6 Federal Register. Changes will result in a 2.6 percent increase to hospice reimbursement next fiscal year, the rule maintains.

Note: See more details about the rule, available at https://s3.amazonaws.com/public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2019-16583.pdf, in next week’s issue of Eli’s Home Care Week.