Home Health & Hospice Week
CMS Backs Off Face-To-Face Encounter Requirements For Medicare Advantage Patients
Home health agencies have caught a break in F2F requirements in one area at least — Medicare Advantage patients.
Background: In its call letter for the 2015 rates for MA plans, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services told plans they would have to apply the same certification requirements as fee-for-service (FFS) Medicare to plan members who receive home health services — including the face-to-face requirement.
The National Association for Home Care “had serious concerns with this directive,” the trade group says in its member newsletter. “NAHC questioned the rationale behind the requirement, given that MA plans have a preauthorization process that would negate the need to follow Medicare FFS certification requirements.”
Outcome: CMS pulled back its F2F re-quirement for MA patients in a June 11 memo to MA organizations, a CMS official confirms to Eli. “We are clarifying that an MAO’s authorization for home health services may substitute for the Original Medicare face-to-face certification requirement for the authorization of home health care services,” CMS tells MA plans in the missive.
Home Health & Hospice Week
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