Home Health & Hospice Week

For example: Minnesota Public Radio reported on the F2F requirement, noting that it aimed to fight fraud, but instead wraps legitimate providers in red tape.

"Let's laser in on some of the bad actors, and not just throw constant regulation over the people who are trying to do the right thing," the Minnesota Home Care Association's Neil Johnson told the radio station.

Some Medicare beneficiaries have too much trouble leaving the home and can't get a doctor to visit them, the radio station said.

Home care advocates continue to lobby for changes to the troublesome F2F requirement. In a May 2 "Dear Colleague" letter, Sens. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) tell CMS Administrator Donald Berwick about the "potential negative impact of these rules on access to home health services for Medicare recipients."

"The documentation requirements in the rule placed upon ordering physicians ... are burdensome, duplicative, and impractical for many doctors, especially those in rural and underserved areas," says the letter that the senators plan to send soon.

Changes requested: "We ask that you consider eliminating the narrative requirement and accept the physician's sworn certification of the patient's need for home health services in lieu of this, or alternatively, permitting the use of the model

Physician Certification and Plan of Care (formerly Form 485) to meet the documentation requirements in lieu of the narrative," the letter says. "Altern-atively, we ask for your consideration that non-physician practitioners and home health agency health professionals be allowed to complete the form for patient history and need for services, provided the physician acknowledges the clinical finding and certifies the need for home health services with his or her signature."

Thirty-five senators including six Republicans signed onto Cantwell's last F2F letter in December, the National Association for Home Care & Hospice notes. Another eight Republican senators sent a separate F2F letter.