Home Health & Hospice Week

National Directory of Health Care Providers and Services sounds like a good idea — or a bad one — CMS would like to hear from you.

“As part of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) ongoing work to improve access to care, reduce clinician burden, and support interoperability throughout the health sector, CMS released a Request for Information (RFI) seeking public input on the concept of CMS creating a directory with information on health care providers and services,” CMS says in a message to providers. “We believe that CMS may have the opportunity to alleviate some of the challenges associated with provider directories through an NDH built on a modern interoperable technology platform,” the agency says.

“Integrating an NDH with current CMS-maintained systems, such as NPPES, PECOS, and Care Compare, could streamline data collection by acting as the single entry-point for listed entities to update their data across multiple CMS systems,” the RFI says. “Such data interactions could address provider data accuracy and consistency issues among CMS systems,” it proposes.

Comments are due Dec. 6. A link to the RFI, which is scheduled for publication in the Oct. 7 Federal Register, is at www.federalregister.gov/public-inspection/2022-21904/ request-for-information-national-directory-of-healthcare-providers-and-services.