Home Health & Hospice Week

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has a Fiscal Intermediary Shared System option to help home health agencies track their total and outlier payments, explains regional home health intermediary Cahaba GBA on its Web site.

But the problem is that "the new 'Home Health Payment Totals Inquiry' screen, (FISS Option 67) does not display correct information to allow providers to track outlier payment and HH PPS payment totals," Cahaba says. "Payment totals will display, but the data disappears at the first of each month."

The result: HHAs can't track their own payments "to ensure that outlier payments comprise no more than 10 percent of the HHA's total HH PPS payments for the year," Cahaba acknowledges.

• The rise of compliance and financial regulations is driving another rise -- the need for compliance officers and financial personnel.

According to a handbook recently released by the U.S. Department of Labor, financial examiners and compliance officers are among the 30 fastest growing occupations in the country. With the economic recession finally on a downturn, the business and financial operations occupations segment is slated to show an 18 percent growth from 2008 to 2018, resulting in 1.2 million new jobs according to the DOL's Occupational Handbook and Career Guide.

With the Obama administration's new drives, especially in the health care industry, toward an increase in financial regulations and greateraccountability, the demand for accountants and auditors will grow. That will result in a demand for about 279,400 new professionals from 2008 to 2018. Further, with the business environment becoming increasingly competitive by the day, the demand for management analysts will also increase, the projected number being around 178,300 new professionals. These occupations put together are projected to account for around 38 percent of new business and financial operations jobs.The handbook is at www.bls.gov/oco.

• The extension of the 2010 outpatient therapy caps exceptions process means it's time to take action on your Part B therapy claims.

Previously, the exceptions process for the $1,860 therapy caps expired on Jan. 1. But now Congress has passed and President Obama has signed into law legislation reapplying the caps through March 31, CMS notes in a message to providers.

What to do: If you've been holding therapy claims in hopes that lawmakers would reinstate the exceptions process, you can now submit them for claims processing, Medicare Administrative Contractor NHIC says in an e-mail to providers. If you already submitted claims with the KX modifier even though the caps exceptions process was suspended, your contractor held those claims and will now process them with no action on your part.

However, if you already had claims denied due to the caps and charged beneficiaries for the amount, you now must refund the money to the benes, RHHI Cahaba adds in a message.

Remember: The therapy caps apply only to Part B outpatient therapy, not therapy furnished under a home health plan of care.

• If you've been putting off learning about ICD-10 diagnosis coding because its implementation seems a long time away, now may be the time to change that.

Just around the corner: ICD-10 coding will take effect Oct. 1, 2013 with no grace period, CMS notes. You can get a basic introduction to the system, including dispelling common myths about the new codes, in a CMS educational conference call on March 23.

More information about the call, including registration information, is at www.cms.hhs.gov/ICD10/07_CMS_Sponsored_Calls.asp.

• Earnings have increased for regional chain LHC Group Inc. The Lafayette, La.-based company reported net income of $15.8 million on revenues of $141.5 million for the quarter ended Dec. 31. That compares to a $15.0 million profit on $111.4 million in revenues for the same period in 2008.

LHC has increased its collections procedures and improved its days sales outstanding (DSO) from 48 to 51 days, it notes in a release.

The company also plans to acquire 100 percent of the assets of Salem Hospital Home Care in Salem, Ore., LHC says in a separate release.

Salem serves six counties in Oregon and has annual revenues of $5.5 million, the company adds.

• Gentiva Health Services Inc. is increasing its hospice presence in Mississippi. The Atlanta-based national chain has acquired Heart to Heart Hospice with offices in Tupelo and Starkville.

Heart to Heart serves 22 counties in the state and has annual revenues of about $4 million, Gentiva says in a release. The company will now cover 44 Mississippi counties.

"This transaction is consistent with our strategy to concentrate our resources on adding quality, clinically focused hospice providers with the highest standards of care and support," Gentiva CEO Tony Strange says in the release.

• Putnam County, N.Y. is selling its county HHA to White Plains, N.Y.-based Visiting Nurse Service, reports The Journal News. VNSW will pay the county $250,000, the newspaper reports. The agency would have cost taxpayers more than$700,000 this year, according to The Journal News.

• An Ohio-based home care provider is growing by leaps and bounds. Kettering, Ohiobased Home Care by Black Stone most recently acquired the Columbus branch of Personal-Touch Home Care Inc.,a Bayside, N.Y.-based company with more than 50 locations nationwide, reports the Dayton Business Journal.

Home Care by Black Stone was founded in 1996 and Medicare certified in 2004, it says on its Web site. A few years ago, company leaders' goal was for revenues to hit $10 million this year, notes  the Journal. Now,  it's looking like Black Stone will reach the $22 million mark.

The company plans to triple its growth within three years, the newspaper says. Black Stone,which currently serves 10 counties in Ohio, also recently purchased Family Care Inc. of Cincinnati,  notes the Business Courier of Cincinnati.

• Despite assurances from the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission's latest report to Congress, home care in rural areas seems to be under threat.

For example: In Wisconsin, rural critical access hospitals (CAHs) have shed their home care units in recent years, notes the Dunn County News. Hospitals in Edgerton, Friendship, and Shawano have closed or transferred their home health agencies, the newspaper says.