Prospective Payment System:
Medicare Proposes 2% Increase To HHA Rates In 2010
Published on Tue Jul 07, 2009
Don't be lulled by the deceptive update, trade group warns. Cuts for case mix creep may do more damage to you next year than a new proposed rule shows. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services proposes raising home health agency rates under Medicare 2 percent in 2010, according to a proposed rule published in the Aug. 6 Federal Register. That would take the current episode base rate of $2,271.92 to $2,317.47 effective Jan. 1. However, CMS didn't use a simple inflation calculation to arrive at that rate of increase. Rather, the agency took a 2.5 percent increase resulting from a proposed outlier policy change (see related story, p. 219), subtracted a 2.75 percent case mix creep cut, and then added a 2.2 percent inflation update. Without the outlier policy change, HHAs' rates would see a more-than-half-percent cut. Worse coming: In the final rule, the case mix creep cut figure [...]