Home Health & Hospice Week

New surveyor training materials may help you head off citations.

Home health agencies have had to hit the ground running with Home Health Conditions of Participation compliance as of Jan. 13, even though Medicare has yet to issue the final Interpretive Guidelines for the new regs.

Home health agencies do have a few new resources they can use to shore up their CoP compliance efforts - and ace a potential survey that could be lurking right around the corner:

• Surveyor training video. A Dec. 7, 2017, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services video training surveyors on the new CoPs is now available. The 1.5-hour video covers topics such at Patient Rights, QAPI, and other major additions and revisions to the requirements.

In addition to a webinar link, >http://surveyortraining.cms.hhs.gov/pubs/VideoInformation.aspx?id=161&cid=0CMSHHACOP_UD_Archived contains links to the presentation slides and a CoP crosswalk.

• Survey protocol update. CMS issued revisions to its survey protocol on Jan. 12. The revisions include revised ASPEN (G) tags. See the revisions at www.cms.gov/Medicare/Provider-Enrollment-and-Certification/SurveyCertificationGenInfo/Downloads/QSO-18-13-HHA-.pdf.

"The protocols are not the final IGs," points out the National Association for Home Care & Hospice in a message to members. "We are still waiting for those to be issued."