Home Health & Hospice Week

Proposed cuts are even bigger than CMS says, industry sources maintain. How next year's proposed Medicare reimbursement cuts affect you is going to depend largely on what services you provide and how you code  patients. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services proposes a 3.35 percent cut to home health agency Medicare payment rates next year, according to the 2012 prospective payment system proposed rule published in the July 12 Federal Register. That combines a 2.5 percent market basket increase for inflation, a congressionally mandated 1 percent cut to the MBI, and a 5.06 percent reduction for socalled "case mix creep." The cut will equal a $640 million reduction in Medicare home care payments, compared to 2011 rates. Actually, when you add together all the cuts, it comes to 3.56 percent, maintains the National Association for Home Care & Hospice. The reduction to the base rate amount is 3.63 percent, [...]