Home Health & Hospice Week

Use these 9 tips to get ready for the new requirement by Jan. 1. The earlier you get started training docs on the new face to face encounter requirement, the less trouble you’re likely to have with denied payments when the rule takes effect in the new year. Starting Jan. 1, Medicare will require physicians to perform a FFE either 90 days before or 30 days after the start of care (see related story, p. 322). The legislatively mandated rule aims to increase physician accountability in home care utilization, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services says in the prospective payment system final rule published in the Nov. 17 Federal Register. Despite numerous suggestions from the industry to scrap the FFE rule altogether, CMS can’t do so because it’s required by law, the agency repeatedly points out in the regulation. That means HHAs have to come to terms with the requirement [...]