Home Health & Hospice Week

Don't forget to recheck your patients for Medicare eligibility. If you fail to get a properly timed election statement signed, Medicare can deny your patient's whole stay. Follow these steps to get your notices signed at the right time: 1. First things first. Before you begin furnishing Medicare-covered services, you should first assess the patient for hospice appropriateness and verify her Medicare eligibility, recommends Judy Adams with Chapel Hill, N.C.-based Adams Home Care Consulting. "Providers are responsible for ensuring that they check a patient's Medicare eligibility upon admission," says regional home health intermediary Palmetto GBA in a question-and-answer set from a recent Ask The Contractor teleconference (ACT). 2. Secure your documentation. You must have two essential items in place before starting hospice care, Adams advises -- a "signature on a Medicare hospice election by the beneficiary or their designated agent and ... a verbal or signed certification of terminal illness by [...]